The principal aim of this paper is to estimate a stochastic frontier cost function and an inefficiency effects model in the analysis of the primary health care services purchased by the public authority and supplied by 180 providers in 1996 in Catalonia. The evidence from our sample does not...

Welfare is a rather vague term whose meaning depends on ideology, values and judgments. Material resources are just means to enhance people’s well-being, but growth of the Gross Domestic Production is still the standard measure of the success of a society. Fortunately, recent advances in...

Welfare is a rather vague term whose meaning depends on ideology, values and judgments. Material resources are just means to enhance people’s well-being, but growth of the Gross Domestic Production is still the standard measure of the success of a society. Fortunately, recent advances in...

The principal aim of this paper is to estimate a stochastic frontier cost function and an inefficiency effects model in the analysis of the primary health care services purchased by the public authority and supplied by 180 providers in 1996 in Catalonia. The evidence from our sample does not...

Background Despite the intrinsic value of scientific disciplines, such as Economics, it is appropriate to gauge the impact of its applications on social welfare, or at least - Health Economics' (HE) case - its influence on health policy and management. Methods The three relevant features of...

Research in business dynamics has been advancing rapidly in the last years but the translation of the new knowledge to industrial policy design is slow. One striking aspect in the policy area is that although research and analysis do not identify the existence of an specific optimal rate of...

Background. In Spain's "MIR" system of allocating residency training positions, medical school graduates are ranked according to their performance on a national exam and then sequentially choose from the remaining available training slots. We studied how changes in the MIR system might address...