Hospitalization insurance for OASDI beneficiaries : report submitted to the Committee on Ways and Means by the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare in compliance with House Report 2288, 85th Congress.

  • United States Department of Health, Education, and Welfare
Date:
1959
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hospitalization insurance for OASDI beneficiaries : report submitted to the Committee on Ways and Means by the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare in compliance with House Report 2288, 85th Congress. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    37/126 (page 29)
    percent of the nonmarried persons had larger unpaid medical bills at the end of the year than at the beginning. In the case of beneficiaries with relatively high costs the situation was somewhat different. (For purposes of this analysis, the married couples with medical costs of $800 or more and nonmarried indivi- duals having costs of $500 or more were singled out as having relatively high costs.) Such beneficiaries—a considerable number of whom had a period of hospitalization, namely 85 percent of the couples and 79 percent of the nonmarried—were more likely than others to have some medical costs covered by insurance. They were somewhat less likely than other beneficiaries to assume sole responsibility for costs not covered by insurance, and more likely to have relatives pay some bills, to draw on their own assets, or to increase their outstanding medical debt. These differences are illustrated by the proportions of all bene- ficiaries as compared with those incurring relatively high costs who used selected means of meeting some of their costs (table 10). TABLE 10.—How medical costs were met by all aged OAST beneficiaries and by those having relatively high costs, 1957 ; [Percent] Beneficiary couples |Nonmarried beneficiaries Selected means of meeting medical costs ! Having Having All costs of All costs of $800 or $500 or more more Insurance covered some costS__....___.--__-_-.---_.---- 14 53 9 38 Beneficiary assumed entire responsibility ?._._...._.--- 86 84 79 61 Relatives assumed some responsibility. ........_____-_- 6 16 12 31 Health or welfare agency assumed some responsibility .. 8 2 ll 12 Wiedicalidebtanereased sac2 Sates sesh ee 2d Ze 6 25 3 10 1Ttems not mutually exclusive since beneficiaries frequently used more than 1 means to meet medical costs. 2 Exclusive of any portion covered by insurance. May include payments from assets as well as from current income and any portion as yet unpaid. The seeming paradox that beneficiaries incurring high costs were no more likely na others—and in the case of married couples actu- ally less ikely—to have a public or private health or welfare agency responsible for some of their costs is accounted for by the fact that many of the beneficiaries needing medical care that was relatively high in cost obtained some of it without charge because of limited ability to pay; medical costs were not aggregated for beneficiaries having some care “free.” As indicated above, 6 percent of all beneficiary couples and 8 per- cent of all nonmarried persons were classified as receiving some medical item or service “free.” About half of these cases involved hospitalization. It is highly likely that if the costs of such hospital care could be approximated, the number of beneficiaries with large total medical costs would be considerably greater. Only 9 percent of the married couples or nonmarried beneficiaries classified as receiving some “free” care had any medical costs covered by insurance. A hos- pital or other health or welfare agency assumed at least some respon- sibility for medical costs in most of these cases of “free” care, and relatives contributed a share for 14 percent of the couples and 28 percent of the nonmarried persons.