Abstract
BackgroundDemands for dental services seem to be beyond the capacities of most healthcare systems these days. Patient preferences have been increasingly emphasized to be considered in the joint decision-making process. Willingness-to-pay (WTP) is a recommended method for measuring the utility of health services; increasingly being used in recent decades. Taking these points into consideration, this article aims to provide an overview of the methodological aspects and policy implications of WTP studies in the field of oral health.MethodsThe research was conducted in ISPOR, PubMed and Google Scholar databases. In addition, reference lists of included articles were checked to identify the relevant studies. All studies published were included that were in the English language and reported using WTP for oral health-related goods and services. A data-charting form was developed by a focus group discussion panel of seven experts to derive the main methodological aspects of WTP. Also, Core policy suggestions were categorized through thematic content analysis of the included papers.ResultsThe search strategy yielded 389 studies of which 52 were included. WTP studies in oral health show an increasing trend in global publications. The UK and Canada have a greater share in published material than in any other country. The dominant field of these researches is in restorative and prosthetic dentistry, and a wide range of different methodological aspects was documented. Policy suggestions were categorized in three main themes: (A) setting new tariffs or subsidizing the item, (B) provision of the item due to population preferences, and (C) improving literacy regarding the item.ConclusionsAn urgent need for a common framework regarding the design of WTP studies in dentistry seems paramount. Some policy suggestions seem not to be applicable, perhaps due to insufficient familiarity of the researchers with the complexities of the public policymaking process.
Highlights
Demands for dental services seem to be beyond the capacities of most healthcare systems these days
An urgent need for a common framework regarding the design of WTP studies in dentistry seems paramount
Identification of research question and relevant research studies The main question of this scoping review was: “What are the methodological attributes and policy implications in dentistry of the existing WTP studies?” Keywords were selected under two main concepts: Oral health [with the main keywords but not confined to them; “oral health”, “oral health care”, dentistry, “dental care”, “dental service(s)”] and willingness-to-pay [with the main keywords but not confined to them; “willingness-to-pay”, WTP, “contingent valuation”, “discrete choice experiment”, Discrete choice experiment (DCE), patients’ preferences, patients’ valuations and patients’ utilities]
Summary
Demands for dental services seem to be beyond the capacities of most healthcare systems these days. Willingness-to-pay (WTP) is a recommended method for measuring the utility of health services; increasingly being used in recent decades. WTP seeks to measure the preference strength of an individual for any desired intervention by calculating the maximum amount of money they would sacrifice [6]. This is considered the manifestation of “direct democracy” in public policymaking [7]. WTP can help tailor dental treatment to individual patient valuations in a clinical practice, or help policymakers make informed decisions regarding resource allocation in the public sector and a priority setting across patient groups [8, 9]
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