Objective:
To examine the relation between the health-related behavior clusters and the health services utilization that include outpatient, hospitalization and emergency services.
Data Sources:
The 2001 National Health Interview Survey conducted by the Bureau of Health promotion, Department of Health and the samples were included 16137 adults upper 18-year-old living in Taiwan area.
Methods:
Cluster analysis was used to generalize the health-related behaviors at first. Logistic regression and Poisson regression were used to understand the relationship between the health-related behavior clusters and health services utilization that after control the other influences.
Results:
The health-related behaviors were generalized into there clusters:
5893(36.5%) adults were included in the ?good diet & fitness cluster?, 4146(25.8%) adults were included in the ?addictive cluster?, and 6080(37.7%) adults were included in the ?couch potato cluster?.
The results show that 5909(36.6%) adults ever used the outpatient service in the past month, and the average frequency were 0.73 times;
1259(7.8%) adults ever used hospitalization services in the past year, the average frequency were 0.11 times; 1711(10.6%) adults ever used the emergency service in the past year, and the average frequency were 0.15 times.
After controlling the affection from demographic, social, economics and self-rated health factors, compare to the good diet & fitness cluster, the addictive cluster had the lowest utilization(IRR=0.948) in outpatient service in the past month but had the highest utilization(IRR=1.345) in emergency utilization in the past year; the couch potato cluster had the lowest utilization(IRR=0.827) in hospitalization service but still had iv
higher utilization(IRR=1.165) in emergency service in the past year.
Conclusions:
The adults belong to the ?good diet & fitness cluster? had higher utilization in outpatient and hospitalization service; those belong to the
?addictive cluster? had highest utilization in emergency service; those belong to the ?couch potato cluster? had lowest utilization in
hospitalization service but slight higher utilization in emergency service.
Such a phenomenon, perhaps, was due to the difference on the health knowledge and attitude among the clusters.
We suggest that the further studies could try to investigate the
difference on the health knowledge, attitude and the actual contents of the health services utilization among the clusters, and design the health
education programs depend on the population characteristics. For the purpose of promoting the health knowledge, attitude, health service utilization and health outcome of the adults.
