The Influence Of Long-term Care Insurance Policy On The Utilization Of Medical Services For Middle-aged And Elderly Residents

At present,China’s aging population is accelerating,and the number of disabled people is increasing,which makes the proportion of medical expenses of the elderly rising year by year.In addition,the medical needs of Chinese residents have not been effectively met for a long time.Based on this background,in June 2016,the Ministry of human resources and social security issued the guiding opinions on the pilot of long-term care insurance system,and 15 cities across the country began to explore the pilot of long-term care insurance system.In order to explore the influence of LTCI policy on the utilization of medical services for middle-aged and elderly residents.First of all,this paper reviews the existing research at home and abroad.According to the pilot time of China’s LTCI policy,we use the panel data of CFPS over 45 years old in 2016 and 2018 to carry out the PSM-DID regression.The preliminary regression results show that the implementation of LTCI has improved the utilization of medical services for middleaged and elderly residents in pilot cities.But the significance is not high.Secondly,considering that the real protection objects of LTCI in the pilot cities are the middle-aged and old people with disability and dementia.The results showed that the medical demand of residents aged 45-80 increased by 2.5%,and the annual outpatient and inpatient expenses increased by 717.924 yuan and 1234.143 yuan respectively.However,the change of medical expenses of residents over 80 years old is just the opposite,and the average annual hospitalization expenses decreased by 3431.35 yuan.Although the variables of medical treatment behavior are not significant,the sign is negative,which is consistent with the change direction of medical expenses.Finally,this paper makes a series of robustness tests,in which the "disability" score of the sample is constructed based on the behavioral ability of the respondents in the questionnaire.The purpose of this innovative design is to make the treatment group consistent with the real beneficiaries of LTCI.The results showed that the average annual hospitalization expenses decreased by 8761.209 yuan,which was more than twice as much as before.This shows that the implementation of the LTCI makes the disabled elderly in the pilot cities do not need to receive expensive treatment in the hospital,but transfer to pension and nursing institutions for special nursing services.This measure not only released medical resources,but also promoted the development of the elderly care industry.The conclusion of this study is consistent with the actual situation of the changes of medical and health expenses in the pilot cities,which provides a certain reference for promoting the research on the utilization of medical services effect of long-term care insurance in the future.