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. 2008 Aug;43(4):1442-52.
doi: 10.1111/j.1475-6773.2007.00827.x. Epub 2008 Jan 31.

Use of econometric models to estimate expenditure shares

Justin G Trogdon  1 , Eric A Finkelstein, Thomas J Hoerger
Affiliations

Use of econometric models to estimate expenditure shares

Justin G Trogdon et al. Health Serv Res. 2008 Aug.

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the use of regression models to calculate disease-specific shares of medical expenditures.

Data sources/study setting: Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS), 2000-2003.

Study design: Theoretical investigation and secondary data analysis.

Data collection/extraction methods: Condition files used to define the presence of 10 medical conditions.

Principal findings: Incremental effects of conditions on expenditures, expressed as a fraction of total expenditures, cannot generally be interpreted as shares. When the presence of one condition increases treatment costs for another condition, summing condition-specific shares leads to double-counting of expenditures.

Conclusions: Condition-specific shares generated from multiplicative models should not be summed. We provide an algorithm that allows estimates based on these models to be interpreted as shares and summed across conditions.

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