During the period 1983-86, the period directly following implementation of the Medicare prospective payment system, inpatient hospital care declined. Concurrently, fee-for-service utilization rates for physicians and other noninstitutional suppliers of medical goods and services and for outpatient facility care rose. Medicare expenditures for physicians and other suppliers and for outpatient fa...

Objective: To determine the variables which predict the utilisation of public and private primary health care services, incorporating a number of individual and provider-related variables which are thought to influence the utilisation of these services. Methods: The study employed a self-administered questionnaire to collect data from patients attending both public PHC centres and private dispe...

OBJECTIVE This study examined the relationship between the availability of mental health outpatient services provided by 40 publicly funded community service boards (CSBs) and the use of inpatient mental health treatment among Medicaid recipients. METHODS Three-year data were obtained for Medicaid recipients aged 18-64 from the Medicaid claims database for the Commonwealth of Virginia. Medica...

OBJECTIVE To explore reasons for attending a general emergency outpatient clinic versus a regular general practitioner (RGP). DESIGN Cross-sectional study using a multilingual anonymous questionnaire. SETTING Native and immigrant walk-in patients attending a general emergency outpatient clinic in Oslo (Monday-Friday, 08:00-23:00) during 2 weeks in September 2009. SUBJECTS We included 1022...

This paper characterizes regulatory procedures applied by private health plan operators on their outpatient radiotherapy and chemotherapy services, especially via contracts, and outlines the health care providers’ perception on regulation. The study relied on primary data, taking into consideration 638 hospitals and outpatient health care units with the services in question. A stratified random...

OBJECTIVE This study examined national patterns of outpatient service use by veterans from regions affected by Hurricane Katrina. METHODS Analyses tracked use of general medical and mental/substance use services in September and October through December 2005 in New Orleans and Biloxi-Gulfport compared to a cohort receiving care during the same months in the previous 2 years. RESULTS In adju...