ArticleInternational journal for equity in health2017
Is the medical financial assistance program an effective supplement to social health insurance for low-income households in China? A cross-sectional study.
Article in International journal for equity in health, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 16 papers.
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Who cites it
16 citing papers in PubMed.
- Assessing intervention effects on healthcare-related financial protection in low- and middle-income countries: a rapid evidence review.Health policy and planning · 2026Review
- Regional differences, evolutionary trends, and influencing factors of the level of medical assistance protection across Chinese provinces.BMC public health · 2026Article
- Providing financial protection in health for low-income populations: a comparison of health financing designs in East Asia.International journal for equity in health · 2025Article
- What influences the impact of health financing reforms? Using qualitative comparative analysis to identify patterns in health financing systems and their effects on financial protection.SSM - health systems · 2025Review
- Catastrophic health expenditure and its association with socioeconomic status in China: evidence from the 2011-2018 China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study.International journal for equity in health · 2023Article
- Financial risk protection from out-of-pocket health spending in low- and middle-income countries: a scoping review of the literature.Health research policy and systems · 2022Article
- Article
- User fee removal for the poor: a qualitative study to explore policies for social health assistance in Iran.BMC health services research · 2022Article
- The impact of medical financial assistance on healthcare expenses and the medical financial burden: Evidence from rural China.Frontiers in public health · 2022Article
- Poverty Vulnerability and Health Risk Action Path of Families of Rural Elderly With Chronic Diseases: Empirical Analysis of 1,852 Families in Central and Western China.Frontiers in public health · 2022Article
- Successes and obstacles in implementing social health insurance in developing and middle-income countries: A scoping review of 5-year recent literatures.Frontiers in public health · 2022Article
- Benefit of China's Social Health Insurance Schemes: Trend Analysis and Associated Factors Since Health Reform.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Does inpatient health services utilization vary by remoteness in the medical financial assistance population? Evidence from Shaanxi province, China.BMC health services research · 2020Article
- The effects of poverty reduction policy on health services utilization among the rural poor: a quasi-experimental study in central and western rural China.International journal for equity in health · 2019Article
- Health inequality and community-based health insurance: a case study of rural Rwanda with repeated cross-sectional data.International journal of public health · 2019Article
- Improvement of the reduction in catastrophic health expenditure in China's public health insurance.PloS one · 2018Article
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundChina uses both social health insurance (SHI) programs and a medical financial assistance (MFA) program to protect the poor from illness-induced financial risks. The MFA provides a dual benefit package targeting low-income families: subsidizing these families' participation in SHI programs, and providing cash aid to protect them from catastrophic health expenditure (CHE). This study aims to investigate: (1) the association between MFA subvention for SHI enrollment and SHI enrollment; (2) the association between MFA cash aid and CHE; and (3) the association between SHI enrollment and CHE in low-income households in China.
methodsUsing nationally representative data from a comprehensive survey of low-income households in 2014, we construct an estimate of CHE based on out-of-pocket health spending data. Controlling for other covariates, we estimate the three associations using a three-level logistic model.
resultsThe MFA program subsidizes 50.1% of low-income households to aid their enrollment in SHI programs and provides cash aid to 24.1% of these households. Multilevel logistic analysis reveals that MFA subvention has no significant association with low-income households' SHI enrollment, that MFA cash aid has no significant association with CHE, and that full SHI enrollment is inversely associated with CHE status.
conclusionsThe MFA program is currently not an effective supplement to SHI programs in China in terms of promoting SHI enrollment and providing financial risk protection. The Chinese government needs to invest more funds to expand further low-income household enrollment in SHI programs and to widen the benefit package of MFA cash aid.
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