The paper studies the impact of alternative reimbursement systems on two provider decisions: whether to adopt a technology whose provision requires a sunk investment cost and how many patients to treat with it. Using a simple economic model we show that the optimal pricing policy involves a two-part payment: a price equal to the marginal cost of the patient whose benefit of treatment equals the cost of provision, and a separate payment for the partial reimbursement of capital costs. Departures from this scheme, which are frequent in DRG tariff systems designed around the world, lead to a trade-off between the objective of making effective technologies available to patients and the need to ensure appropriateness in use.
Titolo: | Two-part payments for the reimbursement of investments in health technologies |
Autori: | |
Data di pubblicazione: | 2014 |
Rivista: | |
Abstract: | The paper studies the impact of alternative reimbursement systems on two provider decisions: whether to adopt a technology whose provision requires a sunk investment cost and how many patients to treat with it. Using a simple economic model we show that the optimal pricing policy involves a two-part payment: a price equal to the marginal cost of the patient whose benefit of treatment equals the cost of provision, and a separate payment for the partial reimbursement of capital costs. Departures from this scheme, which are frequent in DRG tariff systems designed around the world, lead to a trade-off between the objective of making effective technologies available to patients and the need to ensure appropriateness in use. |
Handle: | http://hdl.handle.net/11562/627172 |
Appare nelle tipologie: | 01.01 Articolo in Rivista |