What is the best way for healthcare systems to charge sick patients?

Abstract

What is the best way for healthcare systems to charge sick patients? Although everyone might like all health care to be free, this is increasingly becoming an unrealistic aspiration. Healthcare is getting more expensive and a major challenge facing both the developed and developing world is how to make it affordable and available to everyone. Putting aside concerns about charging patients, what method of levying fees would be the most economically efficient and ethically acceptable? The purpose of this paper is to add to the debate on how sick poor patients should be charged for their care in low resource settings. We believe that the appropriate use of information technology (IT) can provide a partial solution to this troubling issue. We really would like this to be an addition to an ongoing debate, and really hope that your readers will engage us with constructive argument and suggestions.