HEALTH INFORMATION AND THE DEMAND FOR PREVENTIVE CARE AMONG THE ELDERLY IN TAIWAN

This paper uses a direct measure of information to empirically investi gate the determinants of consumer health information and the linkage o f the information to demand for preventive care. In our analysis, two equations are estimated: (I) health information and (2) demand for pre ventive care, which includes health information as an endogenous expla natory variable. Overall, the results show that more and better health information increases the probability that the elderly will use preve ntive care. This result, in combination with the finding that health i nformation is not uniform among the elderly, suggests that poor inform ation can become an access barrier to preventive care.