Caroline Chuard, Fabienne Loetscher, Christian P R Schmid
{"title":"Forward-looking Behavior in Health I nsurance.","authors":"Caroline Chuard, Fabienne Loetscher, Christian P R Schmid","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01933-4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01933-4","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>We investigate whether individuals adjust their health care utilization in anticipation of forthcoming price changes. Leveraging an exogenous increase in cost-sharing in the Swiss health care system at the age of 18, we estimate the impact of future price changes on current health care demand. Results indicate that individuals expecting higher future prices augment current outpatient health care spending by approximately CHF 40 (or 5%). This behavior is confined to low-cost male individuals, who likely have the strongest incentives to engage in anticipatory spending. We find no evidence for forward-looking behavior in the inpatient sector. Our study underscores the significance of forward-looking behavior in health care demand analysis, health insurance design, and the potential welfare implications of patient cost-sharing.</p>","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-05-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147845995","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Risk equalization and prevention.","authors":"Wynand P M M van de Ven","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01935-2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01935-2","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Many countries with a competitive health insurance market have implemented a risk equalization system with health-based risk adjusters. An often-heard argument is that health-based equalization payments create a penalty on prevention and health-improving activities, because an insurer that improves its members' health status by effective prevention and good quality care will receive lower future revenues. Eggleston et al. (Can. J. Economics/Revue Canadienne d'economique. 45(4), 1586-1607, (2012)) and Kanters et al. (Soc. Sci. Med. 76, 150-158, (2013)) conclude that perfect prospective risk equalization entirely removes an insurer's incentives for prevention. The goal of this paper is to refute their conclusion. Based on theoretical counterarguments it can be concluded that in the case of both perfect and imperfect health-based prospective risk equalization, insurers have substantial incentives for prevention and health-improving activities. While an insurer bears the full costs of prevention and health promotion activities and may miss some of the future returns, there is empirical evidence that sophisticated (but not perfect) health-based prospective risk equalization does not, in practice, prevent insurers from (1) voluntarily offering coverage for various forms of prevention, (2) voluntarily providing preventive services, and (3) offering their enrollees good quality care, and - thereby - improving the health status of their enrollees. With concurrent (or retrospective) risk equalization insurers are likely to have less incentives for prevention than with prospective risk equalization.</p>","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-05-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147846010","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Health inequalities and subjective wellbeing.","authors":"Francesco Colcerasa, Fabio Pisani","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01932-5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01932-5","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>We contribute to the literature on subjective well-being by examining the relationship between life satisfaction and health inequalities, focusing on both inequality in outcomes and inequality of opportunity. The role of the latter is tested using the Human Opportunity Index. As sensitivity checks, several indexes are computed using either different health outcomes or different combinations of circumstances. Our findings indicate a negative relationship between life satisfaction and health inequalities. We also show that inequality of opportunity in health outperforms inequality in health outcomes in explaining subjective well-being. These results highlight the importance of considering non-income forms of inequality in understanding subjective well-being. They also point out the role of fairness in this relationship. Additionally, we explore the rationale behind the life satisfaction/inequality of opportunity in health nexus. By splitting the sample, we identify a prominent role for pro-social preferences, particularly the well-being of one's own offspring.</p>","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-05-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147823396","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Christian Keutel, Florian Renker, Marco Papatrifon, Dennis Häckl
{"title":"Differentiation of morbidity measurement in Germany's morbidity-based risk adjustment depending on general practitioner and specialist treatment.","authors":"Christian Keutel, Florian Renker, Marco Papatrifon, Dennis Häckl","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01934-3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01934-3","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Morbidity-based risk adjustment schemes are of central importance to prevent incentives for risk selection and to ensure fair competition in health insurance systems with regulated competition, including in Germany. However, systematic under- and overcompensation for certain insured groups persists. This study is based on the hypothesis that individuals treated by specialists tend to be undercompensated, whereas those treated by general practitioners tend to be overcompensated. Using routine data from a nationwide sickness fund, we show that this is true and model an approach that extends the classification model of the German risk adjustment scheme by a differentiation criterion depending on general practitioner/specialist treatment. We demonstrate on the basis of three selected morbidity groups, that the introduction of such a split eliminates the misallocation and improves slightly model performance at the individual level. However, and more important, the effects at the group level vary depending on the type of morbidity group included. The findings suggest that in some cases a general practitioner/specialist differentiation can enhance the model performance by reducing risk selection incentives but raises questions regarding administrative complexity, neutrality of care and policy feasibility.</p>","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-05-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147823380","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Impact of Health Technology Assessment on Pharmaceutical Prices: Evidence from Germany.","authors":"Giovanni Righetti","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01924-5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01924-5","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147788911","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Paweł Niewiadomski, Marta Ortega-Ortega, Błażej Łyszczarz
{"title":"Paid and unpaid productivity losses across 28 European countries due to excess deaths and COVID-19 deaths from 2020 to 2023.","authors":"Paweł Niewiadomski, Marta Ortega-Ortega, Błażej Łyszczarz","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01916-5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01916-5","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147788898","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Micha J Pilz, Georg Kemmler, Jonas Dreher, Madeleine T King, Richard Norman, Bernhard Holzner, Jens Lehmann
{"title":"Cancer specific health utilities - QLU-C10D country value sets for Belgium, Hungary, Portugal and the Republic of Korea - an international valuation study.","authors":"Micha J Pilz, Georg Kemmler, Jonas Dreher, Madeleine T King, Richard Norman, Bernhard Holzner, Jens Lehmann","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01921-8","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01921-8","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147788917","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Mira Hartmann, Baptiste Haon, Lise Rochaix, Jonas Schreyögg, Lasse Falk, Esra Eren Bayindir
{"title":"The add-on list cannot do it all: a comparative economic evaluation of equity impacts in the German and French inpatient care sectors.","authors":"Mira Hartmann, Baptiste Haon, Lise Rochaix, Jonas Schreyögg, Lasse Falk, Esra Eren Bayindir","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01923-6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01923-6","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147788914","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
C Balg, K Frangen, A C Brockhaus, S Sturtz, A Schwalm, S Mostardt
{"title":"Price development of orphan drugs in Germany after market access and subsequent assessments: a descriptive analysis.","authors":"C Balg, K Frangen, A C Brockhaus, S Sturtz, A Schwalm, S Mostardt","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01926-3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01926-3","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147788922","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Carmen Selva-Sevilla, Agustín Ortega-Cerrato, Juan Pérez-Martínez, Manuel Gerónimo-Pardo
{"title":"Is EQ-5D-5L better than EQ-5D-3L? A comparison of descriptive systems and utility scores in patients with kidney chronic disease.","authors":"Carmen Selva-Sevilla, Agustín Ortega-Cerrato, Juan Pérez-Martínez, Manuel Gerónimo-Pardo","doi":"10.1007/s10198-026-01929-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-026-01929-0","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":51416,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Health Economics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147788873","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}