Financial Analysis of New Monetization Methods in Iran Health Insurance Organization

Having an insured population of 39 million, Iran Health Insurance Organization is one of the largest entities in health insurance sector of Iran. The organization needs to monetize in order to equate its resources with its costs due to economic conditions imposed on the country following sanctions as well as the aging trend of the society. That is, the organization needs to take appropriate measures to finance the coverage of health insurance for every Iranian, for which it is responsible in accordance with current law. This study aims at studying modern monetizing methods in Iran Health Insurance Organization.

First, the new monetizing methods were extracted using grounded theory and employing field’s experts’ opinion. Given the lack of finance experts in health insurance sector, the statistical population was consisted of 21 academic and administrative experts of health and insurance economy. Then the analytic hierarchy process was employed to analyze and rank findings.

The nine main monetizing methods for Iran Health Insurance Organization were compared based on absorption rate, and revenue volume, sustainability, and endogeneity. According to the paired comparison matrix, the monetizing from individuals was ranked 1 with a weight of 0.314, internal monetizing was ranked 2 with a weight of 0.264, monetizing from subsidiaries was ranked 3 with a weight of 0.221, business and non-insurance activities was ranked 4 with a weight of 0.209, training and knowledge transfer was ranked 5 with a weight of 0.199, funding from other organizations was ranked 6 with a weight of 0.188, receiving public funds was ranked 7 with a weight of 0.176, and public donations and other monetizing measures were ranked last with weights of 0.165 and 0.163, respectively. For monetizing from individuals, receiving direct payments from recipients of services revealed to be far more significant than other options including selling a variety of insurance policies, introducing complementary insurance, and selling services to regional customers.

Results show that the insured need to carry the main burden of health insurance costs. The government and other relevant agencies are no longer able to finance Iran Health Insurance Organization. This is somewhat different from what other researchers suggest. However, experts believe that the Health Insurance Organization should be financed by service recipients. In order to prevent too much pressure on the insured clients, the organization can take various measures, which are of equal significance to receiving direct fees from service recipients. These include selling various insurance policies, introducing supplementary insurance policies, and selling services to regional clients as an insurance and investment organization.