The Impact of Hospital Price and Quality Transparency on the Supply and Demand Sides of Healthcare Market:A Narrative Review
Healthcare service's price and quality transparency is an essential way to alleviate information asymmetry between providers and consumers,which is critical to improve the efficiency of healthcare market.As one of its application forms,hospital ranking program has attracted much attention in recent years.Based on evidence from the main-stream English journals in Health Eco-nomics and Health Policy,this study conducted a narrative review to investigate the impact of hospi-tal price and quality transparency on(1)consumer's healthcare choices and hospital's market shares,and(2)healthcare quality and hospital's strategic behavior.This study found that hospital price and quality transparency did not improve patients'choice as theory expected,and therefore failed to significantly change hospital market shares.Hospital quality transparency policy improved hospital's performance on some specific quality indicators targeted by ranking and rating schemes.However,it did not significantly improve patients'health outcomes and,alternatively,fostered hospital's strategic behavior.Regulation,competition and reputation are three main channels through which hospital quality transparency could affect care quality.In healthcare sector,non-fi-nancial and intrinsic incentives might be more important than financial and extrinsic incentives.
Information AsymmetryTransparencyReputationHospital Ranking
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