Effects of a cost-sharing exemption on use of preventive services at one large employer

In 2004, Alcoa introduced a new health benefit for a portion of its workforce, which eliminated cost sharing for preventive care while increasing cost sharing for many other services. In this era of increased consumerism, Alcoa's benefit redesign constituted an effort to reduce health care costs while preserving use of targeted services. Taking advantage of a unique natural experiment, we find that Alcoa was able to maintain rates of preventive service use. This evidence suggests that differential cost sharing can be used to preserve the use of critical health care services.