National Health Care Expenditures Study. Out-of-Pocket Expenditures for Personal Health Services

摘要

Examining how Americans use health care services and determining national patterns of health expenditures and insurance coverage are the goals of a landmark study by the National Center for Health Services Research (NCHSR). This study will provide important information and analyses on out-of-pocket expenses for personal health services. Concerns about health care costs typically focus on total expenditures for services. But these expenditures may have little relationship to the magnitude of individual or family out-of-pocket expenses that remain after payment for health services by public or private third-party payers. This data preview from the National Health Care Expenditures Study (NHCES) presents the financial burden on individuals and families of out-of-pocket expenditures for health care in 1977. While high out-of-pocket expenses were relatively rare, nearly one-tenth of all families in the United States spent 10 percent or more of their income on personal health care beyond the amounts paid in insurance or other third party payers.