My Co-Insurance? What’s That?
SOURCE: J Health Econ. 2013; 32 (5): 850-862 [Epub ahead of print]
Forbes Magazine interviews George Loewenstein, a Professor of Economics and Psychology at Carnegie Mellon University, about a study he just published in the September Journal of Health Economics.
Researchers looked at two surveys of Americans, between the ages of 25 and 64, who had private health insurance coverage. Among their findings, they uncovered that only 14% of those interviewed had an understanding of the most basic insurance concepts of “deductible, copay, co-insurance and out-of-pocket maximum.”
The author asks:
“Insurance plans incorporate all sorts of incentives, designed to encourage customers to make specific types of decisions,”
Loewenstein said.“What is the likelihood that they are going to respond to these incentives if they can’t understand the most basic elements of plan design?”
The author of the Forbes article goes on to suggest that people, who will soon be selecting insurance coverage under “ObamaCare”, will have difficulty selecting appropriate coverage if they lack even the most basic understanding of how health insurance works.
This is the form that we use in my office:
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