208483 A Study Examining the United States' General Population attitudes toward spending of healthcare dollars on critical public and personal health services

Wednesday, November 11, 2009: 8:30 AM

Audrey Spolarich, MPA , Spectrum Science Communications, Washington, DC
     
This report will present the findings from three waves of data collection with a Max-Diff design formulated to evaluate and compare the America Consumer's preferences in the purchase of healthcare products and services. We asked 3000 participants, representative of the general population, to choose how they value various healthcare services and products relative to other services and products. The list of services and products is based on the Standard Industrial Classification Codes or SIC codes for healthcare products and services. Our findings indicate that the American public, relatively speaking, does not value mental health services, elder care services or services for the mentally handicapped. There are significant findings about the products and services that they do value as well, including access to emergency services and surgical services. Our design allows us to describe these findings for various sub-populations, such as caregivers, the elderly, youth and other important demographics.

Healthcare reform and healthcare structures have long examined the issues of quality in healthcare delivery and the issue of access to healthcare services. While value is often discussed, no study has been performed to date which measures how Americans value healthcare products and services. This study will provide valuable insights into where and how Americans are willing to spend tax-payer dollars to fund health reform and future healthcare services in this country.

Learning Objectives:
1. Describe perspectives on how American's value various healthcare product and services relative to other healthcare products and services. 2. Describe winners and losers in the area of healthcare spending. 3. Evaluate how their local/state and federal healthcare dollars should be spent 4.List the preferences of the American people when it comes to funding these services. 5. Discuss the elements of Max-Diff Survey methodology 6. Describe the Max-Diff survey analysis, 7. Discuss how the Max-Diff survey methodology can be used to evalue a list of healthcare commodities.

Keywords: Health Care Restructuring, Healthcare Costs

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: Ms. Spolarich has twenty years of experience in research in the public health field. She has published in various medical and public health journals including the Journal of the American Medical Association and Public Health Reports as well as the MMWR. She was an original member of the five-man team set up at NIH to respond to the newly recognized HIV virus, which at the time was still referred to as HTVL-III. In 1991 she published a book, funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts on Programs for Pregant and Parenting Drug Involved Women. In recent years she served as the Chair of the Coalition for Children's Health that was instrumental in the passage of the Children's Health Act of 2000, which included authorization for the National Children's Study. Ms. Spolarich has also conducted research with and for Veteran's organizations among others.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

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