• Journal of Society of Preventive Korean Medicine
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.71-87
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• 2011

Objective : The present study is aimed at providing basic data to help oriental medical hospitals devise efficient operational plans by analyzing the medical expenses of in-patients in an oriental medical hospital and the factors affecting such expenses. Methods : PASW 18.0 was used to analyze the medical insurance program data of 929 patients who were discharged from a university oriental medical hospital(with 105 sick-beds) during the period from January 1 to December 31, 2010 after treatment under the coverage of health insurance and medical aid. Results : 1) Of all the patients hospitalized, 63.3% were females, their mean age was 52.73 years old, and 87.7% was covered by the health insurance program. The biggest number or 31.2% of the patients were treated by the department of acupuncture, 31.5% suffered mainly from the diseases of musculoskeletal system and connective tissues, and the average length of stay at the hospital was 19.49 days. 2) There were statistically significant differences in total medical expenses by age, clinical department in charge, principal diagnosis, and number of days hospitalized while daily average medical expenses differed depending on age, type of medical security, clinical department, principal diagnosis, and number of days staying at the hospital. 3) Total medical expenses were found significantly influenced by age, type of medical security, clinical department, principal diagnosis, and number of days hospitalized(explanatory power : 95.9%), whereas type of medical security, clinical department and principal diagnosis turned out to exercise significant influence on the daily average medical expenses(explanatory power : 26.9%). Conclusion : Oriental medical hospitals are suggested to make efforts to ensure geographical and economical accessibility for their main clients, the elderly and middle-aged, as well as to improve satisfaction of the clients with the medical service provided. They are also encouraged to work out systems to specialize in treatment with a focus on chronic degenerative and adult diseases. In addition, they are expected to try to enhance people's awareness of oriental medicine in an attempt to diversify the brackets of clients and increase frequency of their utilization.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.25-52
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• 1993

Variation in the utilization of medical services is a very important issue in cost containment and quality assurance of health care. Practice variation directly affects health care expenditure especially in fee-for-service system, which is the payment system of health insurance in Korea. In addition to cost issue it is generally accepted that variations in medical practice and the cost of inpatient care suggest the possibility of inappropriate quality of care. This study is to closely examine the patterne and degrees of variation in cost structure of inpatient care among types of hospital and individual hospitals in some tracer diseases, and also to inquire into the service items which contribute much to the variation of total medical care cost. Foru common diseases, i.e. Cesarean Section, appendectomy, cataract extraction and pediatric pneumonia, were selected as tracer diseases. In most tracer diseases there were statistically significant differences in total medical care cost among hospitals in same type of hospital as well as among types of hospital(p<0.01). When total medical care cost were subdivided into the types of service, cost of medication and diagnostic examination varied the most prominenly. When the cost of medication were subdivided again, cost of parenteral antibiotics showed the most prominent variation. Of total medical care cost, medication was most contributory to the variation of total medical care cost(58.1~82.3%), and cost of antibiotics was most contributory to the variation of medication cost(63.9~92.2%). The results of study implicated that reducing the variation of medication may plays a significant role in containing the cost of inpatient care. In order to sort out the factors affecting practice variations including drug prescription pattes further researches are required.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.45-57
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• 2010

Background : If different cost efficiency indexes were informed to the same clinic depending on the inclusion or exclusion of pharmacy cost, it may impair the reliability of provider-profiling system. This study aimed to investigate whether the omission of pharmacy cost affects cost-efficiency rankings in medical clinics. Methods : Data for ambulatory care cost at 23,112 medical clinics were collected from the claims database, which was constructed after review by the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA) of Korea in April 2007. We calculated two types of cost efficiency indexes by inclusion or exclusion of pharmacy cost for a medical clinic. The agreement between the decile rankings of the two indexes was also assessed using the weighted kappa statistic of Landis and Koch. Results : When the cost efficiency index for total cost including pharmacy cost was compared with the index for total cost excluding it, the agreement between the two indexes was only 55%. The agreements between the two indexes were relatively low within specialties which have larger pharmacy volume of total cost and lower correlation between total cost with or without pharmacy cost included than the average level of all the specialties. Conclusion : These results suggest that the omission of pharmacy cost may result in contradictory outcomes that may be confusing to a medical institution and may impair the reliability of provider-profiling systems. It is very important to standardize profiling criteria for the reliability of provider profiling system.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.288-302
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• 2019

Background: The one-person households (OPH) are rapidly increasing and vulnerable to socioeconomic and health problems. Because it is predicted to be inequitable to health care utilization, we would like to find out about the equity of health care utilization of the OPH by comparison with the multi-person households (MPH). Methods: This study followed the theoretical framework of Wagstaff and van Doorslaer (2000), O'Donnell and his colleagues (2008), where the horizontal inequity index is the difference between the concentration indices of actual health care utilization and health care needs. This study employed the 9th Korea Health Panel survey, and a total of 10,807 cases were analyzed. Health care needs were measured by age, sex, subjective health status, chronic disease count, Charlson's Comorbidity Index, limitation of activities, and disability. Results: Compared with the MPH, there were pro-poor inequities in hospitalization, emergency utilization, hospitalization out-of-pocket payments, and pro-rich inequities in outpatient out-of-pocket payments for the OPH. The decomposition of the concentration index revealed that chronic disease count made the largest contribution to socioeconomic inequality in outpatient utilization. Age, health insurance, economic activities, and subjective health status also proved more important contributors to inequality. The variables contributing to the hospitalization and emergency utilization inequity were age, education, Charlson's Comorbidity Index, marital status, and income. Conclusion: Because the OPH was more vulnerable to health problems than the MPH and there were pro-poor inequities in medical utilization, hospitalization, and emergency costs, it is necessary to develop a policy that can correct and improve the portion of high contribution to medical utilization of the OPH.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.352-359
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• 2018

Background: The purpose of this study is to propose an analysis of trends and characteristics of high-cost patients who take over 40% of total national health insurance medical expenses. Methods: It has been analyzed the tendency of high-cost patients by open data based on the medical history information of 1 million people among national health insurance subscriber from 2002 to 2015. To conduct detailed study of characteristics of high-cost patients, multiple regression has been performed by sex, age, residence, main provider, and admission status based on the top 5% group. Results: The amount of medical expenses and the number of high-cost patients have gradually increased in decades. The number of high-cost patients for Korean won (KRW) 5,000,000 category has increased by 7.6 times, KRW 10,000,000 category has increased by 14.1 times in comparing of year 2002 and 2015. Top 5% medical expenses have increased by 4.6 times. In consideration of the characteristics of patients, the incidence of high medical expenses has been higher in female patients than male ones, the older patients than in the younger. Patients residence in Gyeonsang or Jeonla province have had a high incidence of medical expenses than other area. The disease including dementia, cerebral infarction, and cerebrovascular disease for high-cost patients has been also increased. Conclusion: The major increase factor for high medical expenses is the aging of population. The elderly population receiving inpatient care residing in the province that increases high medical costs have to management. There is an urgent need to develop a mechanism for predicting and managing the cost of high-cost medical expenses for patients who have a heavy financial burden.

• Korea Journal of Hospital Management
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.15-25
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• 2018

Purposes: The objectives of this study present the direction of the criteria for the separately reimbursement of therapeutic medical device. Methodology: We summarized experts' opinion using Delphi survey and Analytic Hierarchy Process(AHP). 48 experts were gathered from Medical Insurance Review Nurses Association, medical device industry, academy and association, Medical Device Expert Evaluation Committee. Descriptive statistics, consistency index, content validity ratio were analyzed. Findings: Clinical utility, patient safety, infection control, cost-homogeneity, cost-effectiveness showed high feasibility and importance, but market contribution and functional utility showed low feasibility and importance in a relative sense. The results of functional utility differed between clinical and non-clinical experts. Measurability was low across the whole area. Among the criteria for the separately reimbursement of therapeutic medical device. Patient safety/infection control and clinical utility showed the highest relative importance values, analyzed using AHP. Practical Implications: Patient safety and infection control are needed to be considered as one of Value Assessment Criteria. It is important to find out how to improve the measurability of therapeutic medical device.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.16 no.12
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• pp.533-540
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• 2018

The purpose of this study was to use the data from the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service to analyze the disagreement in disease coding given by different medical institutions on the same disease of the same patient and provide basic data that could help improve the quality of national public health statistics. 9,976,826 patients' data records from the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service-National Patient Sample (HIRA-NPS) of 2014 were analyzed. The disagreement in disease coding differed by movement paths for medical institutions; the disagreement rate tended to increase when moving from a medical institution other than public health centers to a public health center and decrease remarkably when moving from a specialized general hospital to another. Therefore, this analysis of disagreement in disease coding among medical institutions suggests the need to supplement the system so that domestic medical institutions can realize consistent disease coding.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.40-48
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• 2019

Background: As of July 2015, per diem payment was changed from fee for service Therefore, this study aims to analyse changes in medical charges and medical services before and after enforcement of the palliative care, targeting palliative care wards in a general hospital, and provide basic data needed for development of per diem payment. Methods: The subjects of the study were a total of 610 cases consisting of 351 patients of service fee who left hospital (died) from July 2014 to June 2016 and 259 ones of per diem payment at Chosun University Hospital in Gwangju Metropolitan City. Results: The results are summarized as follows. First, after the palliative care system was applied, benefit medical service charges and insurance increased significantly (p<0.001). As benefit medical service charges increased, benefit private insurance payment increased significantly (p<0.001). Second, after the per diem payment was applied, total private insurance payment to medical institutes decreased significantly (p=0.050) and non-benefit also decreased significantly (p=0.001). Conclusion: It is suggested that additional rewards in the obligatory palliative care items should be continuously remedied and monitored to provide good quality hospice palliative care.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.119-125
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• 2021

The purpose of the study was to analyzed the convergence effect of dental insurance knowledge and oral health knowledge on dental insurance recognition satisfaction of adults. Dental health insurance satisfaction recognition, "Need expand the number of treatment subjects of dental treatment" was high, "satisfied cost of dental treatment covered by dental insurance" was low. Dental insurance knowledge was high teeth whitening, orthodontic treatment. Oral health knowledge was high, "the food you eat affects your teeth.". Dental health insurance recognition satisfaction was high when enrolled in private dental insurance. Dental health insurance recognition satisfaction showed a positive correlation with dental health insurance knowledge. Collectively in order to increase the dental health insurance recognition satisfaction, systematic education on dental insurance knowledge and oral health knowledge should be provided.

• Journal of the Health Care and Life Science
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.135-142
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• 2020

The purpose of this study was to analyze the frequency of use of hospitalization/outpatient care of patients with addresses in Yeongbuk-gu, Gangwon-do to identify the medical demand and status of medical use in Yeongbuk-do. The National Health Insurance Corporation (www.data.go.kr) conducted an analysis of health insurance and medical benefits (inpatient/outpatient) claims data from 2003 to 2017. The order of the highest frequency of chronic disease was ranked from 1st to 60th according to 'Healing Case and %'. In addition, the use of patients at Sokcho Medical Center, the only hospital in the Yeongbuk region, was analyzed at the same time. According to the analysis, the use of outpatient treatment and In-patients in the Yeongbuk area of Gangwon-do is increasing due to chronic non-infectious diseases from the past acute diseases. In particular, it is necessary to expand the functions of schizophrenia and obstetrics and gynecology and to carry out specific health projects necessary for the health care of the local community. Through this, we should improve the quality of life in Yeongbuk, Gangwon Province.