Comparing willingness to pay for telemedicine across a chronic heart failure and hypertension population.

This paper presents estimates of the willingness to pay for a new telemedicine technology in the absence of market data. The study utilizes a contingent valuation method to determine patient willingness to pay for access to telemedicine services. Willingness to pay was assessed in two populations: patients who are being treated for chronic heart failure (CHF) and patients who are being treated for hypertension. Patients who were approached to participate in these studies were asked about their preference for using telemedicine technologies. We find that patient willingness to pay has the expected negative relationship between price and the likelihood of purchase and that patients with CHF are less responsive to price changes than those with hypertension.