Consumer-driven health care: promise and performance.
This paper analyzes the evolution of consumer-driven health care in terms of its original vision, its subsequent implementation, and the transformations it has endured as it moves into its second decade. The market is generating product designs that combine elements of consumerism with elements of managed care, but the trend is always toward a stronger role for consumer choice and a weaker role for management of those choices by physicians, insurers, employers, and regulators.
Robinson
James C
JC
Kaiser Permanente Professor of Health Economics in the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley, USA. james.robinson@berkeley.edu
Ginsburg
Paul B
PB
D003254:Consumer Advocacy; D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006264:Health Benefit Plans, Employee / Q000458:organization & administration; D018166:Health Care Reform / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D010358:Patient Participation; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians' / Q000592:standards*; D014481:United States