Comparative efficiency of national health systems

Jan 1, 2002 EDITOR-Evans et al present an unproblematic image of the methods and findings of the World Health Report 2000 despite the controversy that has surrounded the report on conceptual, methodological, and procedural grounds. 1 I have published with others concerns about the report and draw at...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:BMJ 2002-01, Vol.324 (7328), p.48-49
Main Authors: Avery, Gordon, Segall, Malcolm, Evans, David B., Tandon, Ajay, Murray, Christopher L. J., Lauer, Jeremy A., Bonneux, Luc
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Countries
Developed countries
Developing countries
Efficiency
Efficiency metrics
Estimates
Estimation methods
Funding
GDP
Gross Domestic Product
Health care industry
Health care policy
Health policy
Industrialized nations
LDCs
Letters
Life expectancy
Morbidity
Mortality
Peer review
Sustainable development
Validity
Citations: Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Jan 1, 2002 EDITOR-Evans et al present an unproblematic image of the methods and findings of the World Health Report 2000 despite the controversy that has surrounded the report on conceptual, methodological, and procedural grounds. 1 I have published with others concerns about the report and draw attention to some issues relating to the paper. 2 "Healthy" (or "disability adjusted") life expectancy (DALE), the outcome measure used to estimate the efficiency of health systems, is presented as an unproblematic indicator, despite the lack of necessary data for many developing countries and the consequent arcane computational manipulation, often based on speculative assumptions, that was required to arrive at estimates for 191 countries. 3 Uncertainty intervals were calculated for DALEs, but for the methods used the paper refers back to the report, which refers back to an internal discussion paper of the World Health Organization that has not yet been released on its website. Life expectancy is mediocre, levels of healthcare funding are poor (
ISSN:0959-8138
1468-5833
1756-1833
DOI:10.1136/bmj.324.7328.48