Analysis of the demand for pet insurance among uninsured pet owners in the United States.

BACKGROUND

Although cost is often a barrier to providing optimal veterinary care, only a minority of pet owners use insurance to help cover veterinary costs. We sought to estimate consumer demand and preferences for pet insurance and how educating owners on treatment costs and disease risk affects pet insurance uptake.

METHODS

We surveyed 306 dog owners across the United States without pet insurance, including a choice experiment, used ordinary least squares regression to estimate the demand for pet insurance, and conjoint analysis to estimate the pet insurance feature preferences.

RESULTS

Pet insurance uptake increased by 12.3% after veterinary treatment cost and canine cancer risk information was presented to participants. We found that, on average, pet owners were willing to pay $24 more per month for a preventive care service in pet insurance. Forty-four percent of participants were willing to spend up to $1000 to prolong their pet's life a year, while 46% of the sample were willing to spend $3000 or more.

CONCLUSIONS

Our results suggest that providing pet owners' information about the costs and likelihood of disease can increase their willingness to pay for pet insurance. Coverage of preventive care was the most valuable feature in pet insurance among those presented to dog owners.