Original scientific paper
Health Care Expenditures in Croatia, 2000–2013: Is Primary Health Care in the Right Position?
Zvjezdana Brodarić
orcid.org/0000-0002-3473-397X
; Mladenka Vrci} Keglevi}2 1
Mladenka Vrcić Keglević
; Foundation for the Development of Family Medicine in Croatia, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The research was undertaken to determine the trends in the amount and the structure of the health care expenditures
in Croatia from 2000 to 2013. It is based on routinely collected and publicly available data, The Annual Reports of the
Croatian Health Insurance Fund and OECD data. The income of Croatian Health Insurance Fund (CHIF) increased by
66.9%, while total expenditures increased by 62.1%. The fastest growth of expenditure is noticed in expenditures on
health care. The hospital and specialist-consultant services have the highest expenditures. Furthermore, the fastest growth
is that of other expenses, from 7% of total health care expenditures in 2000, to 26.7% in 2013; which can partly be interpreted
as part of hospital care expenses. In the contrast, total expenditures for primary health care decreased, from 22%
in 2002, to 13.1% in 2013. The publicly available data are not sufficient enough to drown up any specific conclusions
about the underlying reasons for such distribution of the costs.
Keywords
health insurance; health care expenditures; Croatia; primary health care
Hrčak ID:
147543
URI
Publication date:
29.12.2014.
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