病人知覺風險及就醫決策的實證研究-以2003年SARS流行為例

The 2003 outbreak of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) affected many countries. In Taiwan, where in-hospital contamination was the major source of infection, seeking hospital care became a health risk. Here we study people ’s perception of health risk and its impact on their use of healthcare services. Degree of public apprehension was measured by the number SARS-related news articles, and information on the number of visits to hospital outpatient departments and community clinics was taken from claims submitted to Bureau of the National Health Insurance (NHI) by such medical facilities. We found that the increase in SARS-related news articles reduced the outpatient visits dramatically during April and June 2003, when the number of suspected SARS case was the highest. During the SARS outbreak period there was an almost 25 percent decrease in volume of outpatient healthcare. We found that, possibly because SARS patients were treated at larger hospitals, the bigger the hospital, the more dramatic the reduction. The impact of the SARS e p i d e mi c o n p e o p l e ’s h e a l t h , especially with regard to its possibly discouraging people from seeking needed health care, needs long-term monitoring