Co-payments and the financial accessibility of medical care: an experimental investigation into the impact of lowering co-payments on patterns of medical consumption and unmet need.

We study the effects of lowering co-payments on medical consumption of low income families. To this end, we exploit a large scale, randomized policy intervention aimed at encouraging take-up of the Beneficiary of Increased Reimbursement Statute. We use administrative health insurance data to measure the budget impact and the effects on specific medical consumption patterns. We perform an additional survey to analyze the effect on subjective unmet need.

Keywords:RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL (RCT), HEALTH ECONOMICS

Disciplines:Public health care, Public health sciences, Public health services, Applied economics, Economic history, Macroeconomics and monetary economics, Microeconomics, Tourism