Does social health insurance prevent financial hardship in Mongolia? Inpatient care: A case in point

BACKGROUND: Protecting people from financial hardship and impoverishment due to health care costs is one of the fundamental purposes of the Mongolian health system. However, the inefficient, oversized hospital sector is considered one of the main shortcomings of the system. The aim of this study is to contribute to policy discussions by estimating the extent of catastrophic health expenditure and impoverishment due to inpatient care at secondary-level and tertiary-level public hospitals and private hospitals. METHODS: Data were derived from a nationally representative survey, the Household Socio-Economic Survey 2012, conducted by the National Statistical Office of Mongolia. A total of 12,685 households were involved in the study. “Catastrophic health expenditure” is defined as out-of-pocket payments for inpatient care that exceed a threshold of 40% of households’ non-discretionary expenditure. The “impoverishment” effect of out-of-pocket payments for inpatient care was estimated as the difference between the poverty level before health care payments and the poverty level after these payments. RESULTS: At the threshold of 40% of capacity to pay, 0.31%, 0.07%, and 0.02% of Mongolian households suffered financially as a result of their member(s) staying in tertiary-level and secondary-level public hospitals and private hospitals respectively. About 0.13% of the total Mongolian population was impoverished owing to out-of-pocket payments for inpatient care at tertiary-level hospitals. Out-of-pocket payments for inpatient care at secondary-level hospitals and private hospitals were responsible for 0.10% and 0.09% respectively of the total population being pushed into poverty. CONCLUSIONS: Although most inpatient care at public hospitals is covered by the social health insurance benefit package, patients who utilized inpatient care at tertiary-level public hospitals were more likely to push their households into financial hardship and poverty than the inpatients at private hospitals. Improving the hospital sector’s efficiency and financial protection for inpatients would be a crucial means of attaining universal health coverage in Mongolia.