| Abstract: | Non-response bias can distort the results of health surveys.The occurrence of selective non-response can be assessed whendata are available for both respondents and non-respondents.The objective of this study was to compare the medical consumptionof respondents and non-respondents to a mailed health survey.A mailed health survey was conducted among approximately 13,500adults and among parents of approximately 1,500 children aged515 years. The net response rate was 70.4%. A panel dataset that could be matched with the health survey data was availablefor all eligible persons. This data set comprises administrativeinformation on hospitalizations, annual health care expendituresand demographic variables. The results of this study show thatresponse was associated with age, sex, degree of urbanizationand type of insurance. After correcting for differences in demographicvariables, respondents and non-respondents differ in the utilizationof several types of care. Relatively more users than non-usersresponded. Response was not associated with the utilizationof care related to severe conditions such as in-patient hospitalcare. The conclusion from this study is that when a mailed healthsurvey is used to measure medical consumption, the non-responsebias will result in a small overestimation of utilization. |
