Economic effect of eHealth: Focusing on the reduction of days spent for treatment

This paper analyzes the economic effect of eHealth system by utilizing the data of “days spent for treatment”. In the previous paper [1], we analyzed how and how much eHealth reduces actual medical expenditures by examining Nishi-aizu Town, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan as a case study. In this paper, we compare results of this analysis with those we obtained from the analysis of medical expenditures. eHealth connects senior people at home with medical or health institutions via telecommunications networks, and the town office has been implementing it since 1994 and keeps monthly receipts in the paper form on medical expenditures of approximately 4,000 residents paid by National Health Insurance for five years from 2002 to 2006. The methodology of the analysis is to choose two groups (i) users; and (ii) non-user of eHealth, and compare days spent for treatment. As for the former group, we selected 412 from the list owned by the town office, and as for the latter group, we chose 450 from the list of National Health Insurance. We send questionnaire on their personal characteristics and diseases. We obtained 199 replies from users, while 209 for non-users. Then we examined receipts of these 408 people, and made a database on age, diseases, the first dates of visiting medical institutions for the first time, the number of visiting medical institution, and medical expenditures. Based on this database, we conducted a regression analysis, and obtained the following results: -Result 1: Users of eHealth have smaller days spent for treatment of lifestyle-related illness than those of non-users. -Result 2: Users of longer practicing eHealth have shorter days spent for treatment of lifestyle-related illness than those of non-users. -Result 3: Users of longer practicing eHealth reduce days spent for treatment larger than those who use it shorter years, if they extend usage one more years. -Result 4: eHealth there has more effect to people who have diseases than those who do not. This paper compares the above results with those we obtained from the analysis of medical expenditures in the previous paper [1]. The analysis and results we obtained provide the rigorous economic foundation of eHealth.