Health insurance schemes: A cross-sectional study on levels of awareness by patients attending a tertiary care hospital of coastal south India

Background: Health insurance (HI) is one of the ways by which Out-Of-Pocket Expenditure can be reduced. However, only 15% of the Indian population purchased some kind of HI. Thus, we aimed to study the awareness, enrollment, and reasons for non-enrollment of HI among patients attending public and private hospitals. Materials and methods: A hospital-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 403 patients from both public and private hospitals attached to a medical college in Mangalore. Patients were interviewed using a pre-tested, semi-structured questionnaire after obtaining a written informed consent. The data were entered and analyzed using SPSS 25. Results: The study shows that 74.4% of the patients were aware of HI. The main sources of information were friends and Newspaper.71% had purchased a HI. The foremost reason to purchase a HI was to cover medical expenditure (84.6%), chiefly the surgical expenses. The most cited reason for non-enrollment in HI schemes was lack of awareness. Conclusion: The awareness regarding HI was found to be high. However, not all who were aware had a HI.