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Incremental health care expenditures associated with hypertension in South Korea

Journal of Human Hypertension (2024)Cite this article

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Abstract

Hypertension is a significant risk factor for cardiovascular disease and the number of deaths due to hypertension increases annually. The increasing healthcare costs of hypertension are a major societal and personal issue. By estimating the medical expenses incurred by patients with hypertension, this study aimed to provide information on the additional costs of hypertension and emphasize the importance of blood pressure management. Health Panel data from 2014 to 2018 were used to calculate incremental out-of-pocket healthcare costs associated with hypertension. First, we compared the mean annual differences in medical expenditure of people with and without hypertension each year. Second, we analyzed five-year panel data from 2014 to 2018 using random Generalized Least Squares. In a cross-sectional mean difference analysis, we found that as of 2018, individuals with hypertension spent an average of 545,489 won more per year on healthcare than those without hypertension. In a five-year panel data analysis, hypertension was associated with an average of 338,799 won in medical expenses per year for the same sex, age, income groups, number of cormorbility and other lifestyle factor. Hypertension incurs incremental costs in treating the condition and its complications. This study aimed to provide information on out-of-pocket healthcare costs associated with hypertension. We highlight the importance of ongoing disease management by discussing the financial burden of chronic diseases on individuals. Managing blood pressure at a young age can reduce healthcare costs throughout an individual’s lifetime.

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Fig. 1
Fig. 2: Mean annual medical cost and cost ratio of hypertensive patients and non-hypertensive individuals.

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Data availability

Raw data are available from the Korea Health Panel Survey upon requestd.

(https://www.khp.re.kr:444/eng/main.do).

Code availability

Stata code used for analysis is not disclosed.

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Acknowledgements

This study used the Korea Health Panel Survey 2014–2018 Annual Data (Version 1.7.3), jointly organized by the Korea Health and Social Research Institute and the National Health Insurance Service. (Version 2.0.1).

Funding

This research was supported by the Development of a flexible mobile healthcare software platform using 5 G MEC, supported by the Institute of Information & Communications Technology Planning & Evaluation, and a grant funded by the Korean government(MSIT). (No.2022000972).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Medical Device Engineering and Management, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, South Korea

    Minji Hong

  2. Department of Public Health, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, South Korea

    Bomgyeol Kim

  3. Department of Cardiology, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, South Korea

    Hyuk-Jae Chang

  4. Graduate School of Public Health, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea

    Tae Hyun Kim

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  1. Minji Hong
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  2. Bomgyeol Kim
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Contributions

Conceptualization: HMJ. Data curation: KTH. Formal Analysis: HMJ. Funding acquisition: CHJ. Investigation: KBG. Methodology: HMJ, KTH. Software: HMJ. Validation: KBG. Visualization: HMJ. Writing of the original draft: HMJ. Writing, review, and editing: KTH and CHJ.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Tae Hyun Kim.

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Competing interests

The Authors have no potential conflicts of interest to disclose.

Ethical approval

This study protocol was approved by the Institutional Review Board of Yonsei University’s Health System (No. 4-2023-0617). Informed consent was waived because of the retrospective nature of the study.

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Hong, M., Kim, B., Chang, HJ. et al. Incremental health care expenditures associated with hypertension in South Korea. J Hum Hypertens (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41371-024-00892-8

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