부산대학교 도서관

Importance: Patient perspectives are crucial in informing design of acceptable services. Background: This study determined patient preferences in glaucoma care. Design: A discrete choice experiment was used to evaluate the relative importance of out‐of‐pocket costs, waiting time, continuity of care, service location and expertise. Participants: Ninety‐eight glaucoma suspects or glaucoma patients were recruited from one public and two private clinics in Sydney. Methods: Twelve choice‐tasks were presented in random order and forced‐choice preferences were elicited. Choice data were analysed using a multinominal logit model (NLOGIT 4.0). Main Outcome Measures: The relative importance and the likelihood of choosing services with each attribute were determined. Willingness‐to‐pay and willingness‐to‐wait were calculated. Analyses were stratified by whether the patient attended a public or private glaucoma clinic and other demographic features. Results: Choice was influenced by four or five attributes: greater clinician expertise, the same clinician each visit, lower out‐of‐pocket costs and shorter wait times (all P <.05). Respondents were willing to pay an additional (Australian dollars) $325 (95% confidence interval [CI] 188‐389) to see a senior eye doctor, and $87 (95% CI 60‐116) to see the same clinician each visit. Respondents were willing to wait for these attributes; however, the estimates had wide confidence intervals and were beyond the range tested. Private patients had a stronger preference for expertise and continuity of care compared to public patients. Conclusions and Relevance: Expertise and continuity of care were important to glaucoma patients in this setting, and they were willing to pay out‐of‐pocket and concede longer waiting times to secure these preferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]