Evaluation of the age structure effect upon the hospitalization expenditure by the Public Universal Health care System in Brazilian state capitals between 2000 and 2010.

In the last decades, world population has experienced a gradual aging process due to the sharp decrease in the fertility and mortality rates. Such a process has occurred in nearly all countries in the world, and has brought forth a concern regarding the increment in the health care expenditures. The aim of this study is to analyze the impact of aging process on health care expenditures in Brazil. In particular, the analysis is performed for inpatient care expenditures that took place in the public healthcare system. The methodology is based on the decomposition analysis of the difference in inpatient care expenditures observed between 2000 and 2010 in each state capital of Brazil. The analysis is performed considering all inpatient care expenditures and disaggregating by two disease groups: infectious diseases and neoplasia. According to the results, the contribution of the population aging process to the increment in inpatient care expenditures is not meaningful. However, the analysis by groups of diseases show that aging process is relevant in explaining the increment in inpatient care expenditures due to neoplasia. Therefore, our results highlight the importance in disaggregating the analysis for groups of diseases in order to understand the effect of aging process on healthcare expenditure.