Work

Financial Risk Protection and Universal Health Coverage: Evidence and Measurement Challenges

Year: 2014

Type: review

Abstract: Financial risk protection is a key component of universal health coverage (UHC), which is defined as access to all needed quality health services without financial hardship.As part of the PLOS Medicine Collection on measurement of UHC, the aim of this paper is to examine and to compare and contrast existing measures of financial risk protection.The paper presents the rationale behind the methodologies for measuring financial risk protection and how this relates to UHC as well as some empirical examples of the types of measures.Additionally, the specific challenges related to monitoring inequalities in financial risk protection are discussed.The paper then goes on to examine and document the practical challenges associated with measurement of financial risk protection.This paper summarizes current thinking on the area of financial risk protection, provides novel insights, and suggests future developments that could be valuable in the context of monitoring progress towards UHC. This paper is part of the PLOS Universal Health Coverage Collection.Collection Review articles synthesize in narrative form the best available evidence on a topic.Submission of Collection Review articles is by invitation only, and they are only published as part of a PLOS Collection as agreed in advance by the PLOS Medicine Editors.

Source: PLoS Medicine

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1001701

Authors: Priyanka Saksena, Justine Hsu, David B. Evans

Institutions: Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute, University of Basel, World Health Organization

Language: English

Topic: Healthcare Systems and Reforms

Subfield: Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

Field: Medicine

Domain: Health Sciences

SDGs: Good health and well-being, Reduced inequalities

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $6,460