2004-04-19
CONCORRÊNCIA ENTRE HOSPITAIS. Num artigo publicado no Journal of Public Economics (Vol. 88, No. 7-8, 2004, pp.1247-1272) com o título " Does competition between hospitals improve the quality of care? Hospital death rates and the NHS internal markets" Carol Propper, Simon Burguess e Katherine Green chegam a uma preocupante conclusão: a concorrência entre hospitais tem um efeito negativo na qualidade dos serviços de saúde prestados. De acordo com os autores "Payer-driven competition has been widely advocated as a means of increasing efficiency in health care markets. The 1990s reforms to the UK health service followed this path. We examine whether competition led to better outcomes for patients, as measured by death rates after treatment following heart attacks. Using data that until 1999 were not publicly available in any form on hospital level death rates, we find that the relationship between competition and quality of care appears to be negative. Greater competition is associated with higher death rates, controlling for patient mix and other observed characteristics of the hospital and the catchment area for its patients. However, the estimated impact of competition is small." Resta-nos o consolo de tal efeito ser pequeno e poder ser específico ao sistema de saúde implementado no Reino Unido.
