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Economic valuation of informal care

An overview of methods and applications

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The European Journal of Health Economics, formerly: HEPAC Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Informal care makes up a significant part of the total amount of care provided to care recipients with chronic and terminal diseases. Still, informal care is often neglected in economic evaluations of health care programs. Probably this is related to the fact that the costs of informal care are to an important extent related to time inputs by relatives and friends of care recipients and time is not easy to value. Development of theoretically sound, yet easily applicable valuation methods is therefore important since ignoring the costs of informal care may lead to undesirable shifts between formal and informal care. Moreover, there is increasing evidence that providing informal care may lead to health problems for the caregiver, both in terms of morbidity and mortality. Until now these health effects have not been incorporated in economic evaluations. More attention for the identification and valuation of the full costs and (health) effects of informal care for the informal caregiver seems needed therefore. This contribution presents a critical evaluation of the available methods to incorporate informal care in economic evaluations.

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Acknowledgements

A previous draft of this paper was presented at the Third International Conference of the International Health Economics Association 2001 in York, UK. We thank Frans Rutten, Wien Limburg, and two anonymous referees for their comments and The Netherlands Organization for Health Research and Development (ZON-MW; grant-number 945-10-044) for their funding. Bernard van den Berg acknowledges support from the Netherlands Institute for Health Sciences (Nihes).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Health Policy and Management, Erasmus Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

    Bernard van den Berg, Werner B. F. Brouwer & Marc A. Koopmanschap

  2. Institute for Medical Technology Assessment, Erasmus Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

    Bernard van den Berg, Werner B. F. Brouwer & Marc A. Koopmanschap

  3. Department for Prevention and Health Services Research, National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, The Netherlands

    Bernard van den Berg

  4. Department of Health Policy and Management and Institute for Medical Technology Assessment, Erasmus Medical Center Rotterdam, P.O. Box 1738, 3000 DR, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

    Bernard van den Berg

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  1. Bernard van den Berg
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Correspondence to Bernard van den Berg.

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van den Berg, B., Brouwer, W.B.F. & Koopmanschap, M.A. Economic valuation of informal care. HEPAC 5, 36–45 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10198-003-0189-y

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