Government doctor absenteeism and its effects on consumer demand in rural north India
研究了印度北部农村政府医生缺勤如何影响消费者对发热门诊治疗的需求，发现消除缺勤可使政府服务使用率从18%升至50%。
Government doctor absenteeism from their public posts is a sizable problem across developing economies. The consumer demand estimation for outpatient fever treatment presented in this paper investigates the interrelationship between government doctor absenteeism and the large informal healthcare sector. Using a counterfactual framework, this paper estimates treatment effect of eliminating government doctor absenteeism. The effects are measured by changes to the market share of government Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) providers and resulting own-price elasticities of demand for government MBBS providers and unqualified providers. Modelling incorporates patients expected health outcomes by provider via the use of a qualitative measure of word-of-mouth recommendations. Results indicate that eliminating government MBBS provider absenteeism in North India would increase utilisation of government outpatient fever treatments from 18% to 50%.