Population aging and hospitalization expenses of SUS: an analysis performed for Brazil between 2000 and 2010

Abstract

The world population is experiencing a gradual process of aging of its age structure, due to the sharp decline in fertility and mortality in recent decades. This process, in course practically in all countries of the world, brings up the concern about health spending growth. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the effect of the changes in the age structure on hospitalization spending of the Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS) in Brazil. To achieve this goal a breakdown of health expenditures was performed using Tchoe and Nam method, adapted to the reality of the Brazilian case. The decomposition is also performed considering three groups of diseases: infectious and parasitic diseases, cancer and circulatory. The data are from the Sistema de Informação Hospitalar (SIH-SUS). In general, the results of the decomposition show the importance of variation in age structure (aging population) on SUS hospitalizations spending between 2000 and 2010, especially for groups of diseases associated with an aging population, such as circulatory diseases and cancer.