NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH
NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH

Managed Care Discounting: Evidence from the MarketScan Database

Avi Dor, Siran M. Koroukian, Michael Grossman

NBER Working Paper No. 10437*
Issued in April 2004
NBER Program(s):   HE

The NBER Bulletin on Aging and Health provides summaries of publications like this.  You can sign up to receive the NBER Bulletin on Aging and Health by email.

The paper examines price discounting by health maintenance organizations and preferred provider organizations in markets for hospital services. Our empirical analysis focuses on transaction prices for angioplasty, which is a relatively common procedure, with well defined 'product' characteristics. After controlling for patient and procedure heterogeneity and market power we find that on average prices for PPOs are 8% lower than fee-for-service plans, followed by point-of-service HMOs who capture a 24% discount. Our results are in general agreement with earlier work that shows that managed care discounts are 'real', after accounting for process of care.

*Published: Dor, Avi, Siran M. Koroukian and Michael Grossman. "Managed Care Discounting: Evidence From The MarketScan Database," Inquiry - Excellus Health Plan, 2004, v41(2,Summer), 159-169.

You may purchase this paper on-line in .pdf format from SSRN.com ($5) for electronic delivery.

Information about Free Papers

You should expect a free download if you are a subscriber, a corporate associate of the NBER, a journalist, a site with your domain name in ".GOV", or a resident of nearly any developing country or transition economy.

If you usually get free papers at work/university but do not at home, you can either connect to your work VPN or proxy (if any) or elect to have a link to the paper emailed to your work email address below. The email address must be connected to a subscribing college, university, or other subscribing institution. Gmail and other free email addresses will not have access.

E-mail:

Machine-readable bibliographic record - MARC, RIS, BibTeX

 
Publications
Activities
Meetings
Data
People
About

National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA 02138; 617-868-3900; email: info@nber.org