Health care access in Korea has improved overall over the years by means of, among other things, continued expansion of the National Health Insurance coverage. However, monitoring of health care quality and disparities is critical to getting improved health care access materialize into improved population health. Health care quality and access call for added interest, since they are key determinants of improvement in the population’s health. To bring about improvement in the quality of health care requires continued monitoring of areas of progress and regress. Of particular importance is monitoring of health care quality and performance in terms especially of health outcomes, which constitute a value that patients and society seek. Despite the overall improvement in health care in Korea and elsewhere in the world, disparities persist in health care access and quality in many countries due to various social risk factors. This study was aimed at monitoring health care quality and disparities using health outcome indicators and drawing implications for policy. As to chronic care, this study examined health-related quality of life in patients with chronic conditions, the sufficiency, or lack thereof, of support from the health care system, unplanned hospitalizations due to conditions that are manageable in an outpatient setting, and medication adherence in hypertensives and diabetics. Trends in unplanned hospitalizations were further examined for children aged 18 and younger with asthma, diabetes, or epilepsy. The outcome measures examined with respect to acute care concern unnecessary emergency admissions, prevalence of readmission within 30 days of discharge, and health outcomes within one year of the onset of congestive heart failure or ischemic stroke.
