The Economic Burden of Cancers on Indian Households

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Author
Mahal, A; Karan, A; Fan, VY; Engelgau, MDate
2013-08-12Source Title
PLoS OnePublisher
PUBLIC LIBRARY SCIENCEUniversity of Melbourne Author/s
Mahal, AjayAffiliation
Melbourne School of Population and Global HealthMetadata
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Journal ArticleCitations
Mahal, A., Karan, A., Fan, V. Y. & Engelgau, M. (2013). The Economic Burden of Cancers on Indian Households. PLOS ONE, 8 (8), https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0071853.Access Status
Open AccessAbstract
We assessed the burden of cancer on households' out-of-pocket health spending, non-medical consumption, workforce participation, and debt and asset sales using data from a nationally representative health and morbidity survey in India for 2004 of nearly 74 thousand households. Propensity scores were used to match households containing a member diagnosed with cancer (i.e. cancer-affected households) to households with similar socioeconomic and demographic characteristics (controls). Our estimates are based on data from 1,645 households chosen through matching. Cancer-affected households experienced higher levels of outpatient visits and hospital admissions and increased out-of-pocket health expenditures per member, relative to controls. Cancer-affected households spent between Indian Rupees (INR) 66 and INR 85 more per member on healthcare over a 15-day reference period, than controls and additional expenditures (per member) incurred on inpatient care by cancer-affected households annually is equivalent to 36% to 44% of annual household expenditures of matched controls. Members without cancer in cancer-affected households used less health-care and spent less on healthcare. Overall, adult workforce participation rates were lower by between 2.4 and 3.2 percentage points compared to controls; whereas workforce participation rates among adult members without cancer were higher than in control households. Cancer-affected households also had significantly higher rates of borrowing and asset sales for financing outpatient care that were 3.3% to 4.0% higher compared to control households; and even higher for inpatient care.
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