Determinants of Health Care Utilization

In view of increasing costs in the German health care sector that was accompanied by the extension of economic incentives set by health insurance providers, this study investigates the relevance of health insurance schemes and other socioeconomic characteristics to the level of health care utilization. Database is the German sample of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). For the ambulatory health care sector previous findings support the assumption of a bipolar health care system providing general practitioner care primarily to the statutory insured and specialist care to the privately insured. First results on inpatient health care utilization show that it generally depends more on the need for health care (the health status) than ambulatory health care utilization. Nevertheless the type of health insurance shows significant influence: patients with additional private health insurance coverage show a higher general probability for at least one night in hospital than members of the statutory health insurance without additional private coverage. First results of the project have been published in the Journal of Public Health.