cq3; preventative vs. curative Flashcards
Why has health expenditure increased over the years?
It costs more to ‘cure’ a disease, than prevent it and a large amount of the population already have these diseases due to an ageing population.
How much has healthcare expenditure increased by?
$160 billion (2015) to $185 billion (2018) to $261 billion (2024)
Why should Australia lean towards prevention?
Leading causes of death and illness are lifestyle related and highly preventable
Why is it cheaper to spend money on health promotion and prevention rather than treatment?
An individual will spend more for treatment than prevention of their illness (e.g. gym membership now to accumulated yearly expenses for cardiovascular disease)
Why is it so much more expensive to treat illnesses rather than prevent them?
- Usually compounded and expensive
- Equipment used for treatment is expensive
- Often requires highly trained professionals
- Often requires lengthy hospital stays
If we know prevention programs work, then why aren’t we allocating more funding to intervention and prevention?
- There are already so many people that need curative services
- Not all diseases can be prevented (e.g. type 1 diabetes)
- We live in an ageing population, harder to prevent diseases when old + more likely to have diseases
What are the examples for prevention?
- National tobacco strategy
- SunSmart
- Quitline
What are the examples of curative expenditure?
- PBS
- Medicare
How much of the health care budget goes to curative treatment?
Previously 98% but now 80% of the $261bn budget
What are the disadvantages of curative treatment?
- creates inequities and its why health facilities are only equitable to a moderate extent.
- relies heavily on access and some determinants restrict access more for particular sub groups
- the more that is spent on curative, the less that goes to prevention, thus assisting to make things more inequitable.
What are the benefits of prevention?
- empowers people to take control of their own health
- relies less on access
- improves equity by addressing health literacy and focusing on lifestyle behaviours
- reduces the burden on the health care system
What is the paradoxical nature of the Australian approach to preventative expenditure?
although there has been a shift towards prevention over the last 25 years, it only makes up 2% of the health care budget.
but recently it has made up 20% of the budget