Factors affecting out of pocket health care expenditure among Sunanese households

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Health is a human right yet out of pocket Health expenditure seems to be a factor that impoverishes people in Sudan. OBJECTIVE: This study was conducted to identify factors affecting individual OOP health expenditure for different types of health care and total health care expenditure. METHOD: This is using Secondary data from Sudan Household health utilizations and expenditure survey 2010.a total of 15000 households and 75184 individuals were included in two types of regressions. OLS, seemingly unrelated regression and Tobit were used for all related type of care (non-chronic care, chronic care, preventive care, dental care, and health expenditure abroad) RESULTS: Variables that usually positively impact OOP spending include age groups, education level, widowed, land capacity, hospital rate, bed rate. Variables that usually negatively impact OOP spending include divorce, type of medical personnel as well as some of state dummies. Recall that the OOP variables come from the summation of treatment cost, cost of food, and accommodation for the co patient and transportation cost. Transportation costs seem to be very high for all type of care. This suggests that the distribution of medical personnel and medical facilities is unequal.