Mantwill Sarah, Schulz Peter J
Institute of Communication & Health, University of Lugano, Switzerland.
Institute of Communication & Health, University of Lugano, Switzerland.
Patient Educ Couns. 2015 Jul 10. doi: 10.1016/j.pec.2015.07.006.
Studies have shown that people with lower levels of health literacy create higher emergency, inpatient and total healthcare costs, yet little is known about how health literacy may affect medication costs. This cross-sectional study aims at investigating the relationship between health literacy and three years of medication costs (2009-2011) in a sample of patients with type 2 diabetes.
391 patients from the German-speaking part of Switzerland who were insured with the same health insurer were interviewed. Health literacy was measured by a validated screening question and interview records were subsequently matched with data on medication costs. A bootstrap regression analysis was applied to investigate the relationship between health literacy and medication costs.
In 2010 and 2011 lower levels of health literacy were significantly associated with higher medication costs (p<.05).
The results suggest that diabetic patients with lower health literacy will create higher medication costs.
Besides being sensitive towards patients' health literacy levels, healthcare providers may have to take into account its potential impact on patients' medication regimen, misuse and healthcare costs.
研究表明，健康素养水平较低的人群会产生更高的急诊、住院及总体医疗费用，但对于健康素养如何影响药物治疗费用却知之甚少。这项横断面研究旨在调查2型糖尿病患者样本中健康素养与三年药物治疗费用（2009 - 2011年）之间的关系。
对来自瑞士德语区且由同一家健康保险公司承保的391名患者进行了访谈。通过一个经过验证的筛查问题来衡量健康素养，随后将访谈记录与药物治疗费用数据进行匹配。应用自抽样回归分析来研究健康素养与药物治疗费用之间的关系。
在2010年和2011年，较低的健康素养水平与较高的药物治疗费用显著相关（p <.05）。
结果表明，健康素养较低的糖尿病患者会产生更高的药物治疗费用。
除了要对患者的健康素养水平保持敏感外，医疗服务提供者可能还必须考虑其对患者药物治疗方案、药物滥用及医疗费用的潜在影响。
