Low-Value Care in Outpatient Care
What is the extent of unnecessary care that is provided to patients in Switzerland?
Factsheet
- Schools involved School of Health Professions
- Institute(s) Institute of Health Economics and Health Policy
- Strategic thematic field Thematic field "Caring Society"
- Funding organisation SNSF
- Duration (planned) 01.03.2022 - 28.02.2027
- Head of project Prof. Dr. Tobias Benjamin Müller
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Project staff
Prof. Dr. Tobias Benjamin Müller
Daniel Ammann
Aline Louise Obrist - Keywords Low-value care; overtreatment; outpatient sector
Situation
OECD estimates show that about 20% of healthcare spending is wasteful or even harmful. Patients often receive services with questionable medical benefits - so-called low-value care
Course of action
As part of a large-scale literature search and Smarter Medicine, we identify a catalog of services and treatments that provide limited or no medical benefits. We quantify the extent and trends in medical overuse in the Swiss outpatient sector based routine claims data.
Result
Applying 19 indicators to Swiss claims data, we find that more than 620,000 potential low-value services were provided to patients between 2018-2023, corresponding to more than 7 million services and CHF 600 million in unnecessary spending nationwide. Low-value care was concentrated in high-frequency routine services: more than one in six eligible men aged 75 and older received low-value PSA testing, and more than one in three pa-tients undergoing knee arthroscopy had received no prior physiotherapy. The aggregate volume of low-value services grew by 10% between 2018 and 2023, with no evidence of system-level improvement. Chronic illness, lower deductibles, and supplementary insurance coverage were all positively associated with receiving low-value care.
