Health Service Utilization Patterns Among The Chronically Disabled Aged in Korea.
- Author:
Kyung Hwan CHO
1
Author Information
1. Department of Family Medicine, Korea University College of Medicine
- Publication Type:Original Article
- Keywords:
Chronic disease;
Aged;
Utilization
- MeSH:
Aged;
Chronic Disease;
Delivery of Health Care;
Diagnosis;
Female;
Hand;
Health Services*;
Humans;
Inpatients;
International Classification of Diseases;
Korea*;
Long-Term Care;
Male;
Primary Health Care;
Tertiary Healthcare
- From:Journal of the Korean Geriatrics Society
1997;1(1):55-64
- CountryRepublic of Korea
- Language:English
-
Abstract:
OBJECTIVE: Author hypothesized that the presence of a chronic disease burden would change patients' use of health services. METHODS: This research used 4,020,172 medical payment requests(corrected for duplication) and a subset of 1,342,845 payment requests for chronic disease to analyze the pattern of health services utilization among the aged in Korea in 1991. Chronic disease was defined by ICD-9 codes as used in the US Health Services Interview Survey. Author traced the utilization of primary, secondary and tertiary facilities by diagnoses of patients. Thereafter author compared the utilization of health service by age groups, sex, and patterns of care in the chronically disabled. RESULTS: Our data showed that younger seniors are more likely to self refer to tertiary health care. Men are more likely to use tertiary care. On the other hand, women tend to use more primary care. Inpatient tertiary level service is strongly preferred over secondary or primary health services. Patients with chronically disabled had increased use of tertiary care facilities and more self-referrals for care. Secondary health service appeared to be under used. CONCLUSIONS: Comparing the results of utilization pathway of elder clients showed chronically disabled patients overutilize the health service and pursuit the multi-pathways. Especially, overused tertiary care by the elderly may play a part in overstraining of tertiary medical resources in Korea. Thus, there is a strong necessity to introduce long term care systems for the chronically disabled elderly in Korea.
