Participating farmers' equity of hospitalization benefit under the new rural cooperative medical system: Evidence from Shaanxi Province

Background and aim: In 2002, the Chinese government began to gradually establish a new rural cooperative medical system (NRCMS) aimed at providing integrated subsidy mainly for serious diseases (during hospitalization).To analyze and evaluate the participating farmers' benefit equity of hospitalization under NRCMS, this article used data from the household survey on health services gathered in Shaanxi Province as part of the Fourth National Health Service Survey (NHSS). Methods: We adopt a concentration index to measure equity, and a Tobit regression model is employed to analyze the factors influencing the hospitalization subsidy. Results: We ranked participating farmers according to their village's per-capita expenditure and then divided them into five quintiles. An analysis of each group's inpatient expense, inpatient xpense paid by NRCMS, and the compensation rate for inpatient revealed no significant differences among the groups. The concentration indices of the number of times inpatient benefited from NRCMS and inpatient expense paid by NRCMS were 0.142 and, 0.094, respectively. All participating farmers were then classified according to their household per-capita expenditure. There were significant differences in per-visit inpatient expense and per-visit inpatient expense paid by NRCMS among the groups, but there was no significant difference in the compensation rate for inpatient. The concentration indices of the number of times inpatient benefited from NRCMS and inpatient expense paid by NRCMS were 0.253 and 0.355, respectively. Conclusions: The results showed during the process of implementation of the NRCMS, a benefit inequity existed in the hospitalization of the participating farmers of the underdeveloped western region. Overall, however, the inequity was not very large.