Can Consumers Control Health-Care Costs?

Area of Science:

• Health policy
• Health economics
• Consumer behavior

Background:

• Managed care failed to control healthcare costs and quality.
• Current health policy shifts focus to patient consumerism, leveraging market-based principles.
• Policies now incentivize patients to use personal funds for healthcare decisions.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of health care consumerism and mandated information disclosure.
• To assess the underlying assumptions about human behavior in consumer-driven healthcare.
• To examine empirical evidence on how patients make healthcare choices.

Main Methods:

• Literature review of theories on consumer behavior in healthcare.
• Analysis of empirical data on patient decision-making for health plans, providers, and treatments.
• Assessment of the prerequisites for successful consumerism in healthcare.

Main Results:

• Consumerism's success hinges on numerous demanding prerequisites, including choice availability, reliable and accessible information, and patient comprehension.
• Empirical evidence indicates these prerequisites are frequently unmet, with patients facing significant hurdles.
• The study concludes that consumerism is unlikely to meet its objectives of cost control and quality optimization.

Conclusions:

• Health care consumerism, despite its aims, is unlikely to achieve its goals due to practical limitations in patient decision-making.
• Mandated information disclosure, a key tool of consumerism, faces challenges in ensuring effective patient understanding and utilization.
• While not a panacea, consumerist approaches may foster cost-consciousness, contributing indirectly to broader cost-control efforts by highlighting trade-offs in medical spending.