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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Recorded presentation

Jeffrey A. Rhoades, PhD, Center for Financing, Access, Cost and Trends, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, 540 Gaither Road, Rockville, MD 20850, 301-427-1471, jrhoades@ahrq.gov, Llewellyn J. Cornelius, PhD, School of Social Work, University of Maryland, Baltimore, Louis L. Kaplan Hall, 525 West Redwood Street, Baltimore, MD 21201, and Barbara M. Altman, PhD, Office of Analysis and Epidemiology, National Center for Health Statistics, 6525 Belcrest Road, Hyattsville, MD 20782.

The Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS) collects extensive information on health care, expenses, sources of payment, and insurance coverage from a nationally representative sample of the U.S. civilian non-institutionalized population. The 2003 MEPS is used to illustrate three methods of estimating direct medical expenditures for hospitalizations, emergency room visits, outpatient hospital visits, office-based medical provider visits, home health care, and prescribed medicines for obesity (defined as a body mass index of 30 or greater). The methods include (1) a summation of medical care expenditures for the sample population with obesity, (2) a population attributable fraction methodology that captures the cost of co-morbidities associated with obesity , and (3) a two-part regression model that predicts medical expenditures for people with and without obesity. The results are used to highlight the impact of different methodologies and assumptions on direct medical expenditure estimates for obesity and to assess the strengths and weakness of using MEPS as the primary data source in each of the three approaches to estimating the cost of obesity.

Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of the session, the participant (learner) in this session will be able to

• List three different methodologies for determining the health care costs of obesity.
• Articulate the strengths and weaknesses of the three different methods of determining the cost of obesity as discussed in the presentation.
• Assess the strengths and weaknesses of using the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey for determining the cost of obesity.

Keywords: Obesity, Cost Issues

Related Web page: www.meps.ahrq.gov

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Any relevant financial relationships? No

Recorded presentation