Center for Health Policy

Characterizing the Indiana Context: An Update to Understanding Costs of Care in the State

Rising health care costs in Indiana, coupled with relatively poor health outcomes, are of concern to Indiana leaders. Stakeholder groups across sectors recognize that failing to address the state’s public health issues will impede business vitality and long-term economic growth. However, different groups may have different incentives, constraints, and conceptions of the state’s health care landscape.

At the request of the Indiana Business Health Collaborative, the Indiana University Fairbanks School of Public Health in Indianapolis prepared this report to help the state’s key stakeholders establish a shared knowledge base on factors that affect health care spending and costs.

Characterizing the Indiana Context: An Update to Understanding Costs of Care in the State report cover

The current report is an update to our previous document, “Addressing Factors that Affect Health Care Costs: Recommendations for Indiana Stakeholders,” published in January 2020. Our previous report was published at a time of enhanced dialogue regarding health care costs in the state.

While much of the discussion at the time revolved around the relatively high prices that Indiana’s self-insured employers paid for hospital care compared to other U.S. states, our report showed that this was just one piece of the overall issue, albeit an important piece for self-insured employers.

We highlighted other drivers of health care costs in the state, including rising costs of pharmaceuticals and relatively high disease burdens among Hoosiers. Our current report updates select aspects of our original report with more contemporary information regarding Indiana’s health care business landscape.

View the full report

Center for Health Policy

Characterizing the Indiana Context: An Update to Understanding Costs of Care in the State

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