OBJECTIVE: This study was to explore the association between having a usual source of care and adherence to medicines in patient with chronic diseases. METHODS: The 2012 Korea Health Panel was used as a data source. We analyzed 4,418 respondents that were diagnosed with chronic diseases and utilized health care services. Non-adherence to medication, a dependent variable, was defined as "not taking the medicines that were prescribed for treating chronic disease" or "not following the direction for medication". Whether having a usual source of care or not was used as a key independent variable, which was defined as having a regular site or a regular doctor for medical test, treatment, and consultation. Sex, age, education level, marital status, income, the type of health insurance, the number of chronic disease and CCI (Charlson Comorbidity Index) were included as covariates in the analysis. We conducted a multivariate logistic regression. RESULTS: Totally, 30 percent of respondents reported to experience nonadherence to medication. Having a usual source of care was significantly associated with lower non-adherence to medication regardless its type, which is a regular doctor (OR=0.61, 95% CI=0.53-0.70) or a regular site (OR=0.67, 95% CI=0.58-0.78). Furthermore, having a usual source of care was associated with both of medication persistence (OR=0.66, 95% CI=0.54-0.81) and compliance (OR=0.65, 95% CI=0.56-0.76). CONCLUSION: Our results showed the possibility that usual source of care is able to conduct a positive role in improving adherence to medication with better management of chronic disease.
Chronic Disease* ; Comorbidity ; Compliance ; Delivery of Health Care ; Education ; Humans ; Information Storage and Retrieval ; Insurance, Health ; Korea ; Logistic Models ; Marital Status ; Medication Adherence ; Surveys and Questionnaires

This study reviewed primary care purchasing issues of the Indonesian single-insurer, BPJS-K, in the context of triangular power relations between the government, the insurer, and the providers, and considered its challenges of purchasing as the national single-insurer. Some literature reviews and interviews with Indonesian stakeholders and residents were used to describe the historical and social contexts of Indonesian healthcare and social health insurance systems especially focusing legal and institutional status of BPJS-K and primary care provision and delivery conditions in remote areas. Though BPJS-K directly belongs to the presidential office of Indonesia, it has limited power in terms of purchasing as a single insurer. Mainly it was due to the lack of primary care resources, Ministry of Health's strong power as the regulator and provider as the regulator and provider, and BPJS-K’s powerlessness against monitoring and quality of care assessment. Ambiguous accountability was another issue among the insurer and the Ministry of Health. This created confusions in primary care provision. It is suggested that each agencies’ accountability should be obvious in terms of legal, political, and social contexts.

Background: It is well known that the distribution of therapeutic materials is very complex. However, it is not easy to demonstrate the concrete problems caused by distribution channels empirically. The purpose of this study was to investigate the differences in the price of therapeutic materials according to the type of purchasing agency and the way in which medical institutions purchase therapeutic materials. Methods: This study compared the claimed prices and the maximum allowable prices for the items of therapeutic material used for general spinal surgery. Results: Ilsan Hospital, which purchased directly without a purchasing agent, had the lowest claimed prices, followed by a large professional purchasing agency, a foundation-related purchasing agency, and a general purchasing agency. In addition, the difference between the claimed prices and the maximum allowable prices according to the purchase type was larger in the expensive treatment materials, and in the case of the lower price treatment materials, it tended to converge to the maximum allowable prices. Conclusion National health insurance spending for therapeutic materials are to be affected by the distribution channels of them. We proposed several ideas to rationalize the expenditure such as classification of therapeutic materials on the basis of price or other criteria.