Efficiency of healthcare system in Slovakia
The Slovak population is aging and the number of people with chronic diseases is increasing. The demand for high-quality health care with the use of modern treatment procedures (many times with a significantly higher price) is growing, and along with it, the expectations of patients. The result is a rise in health care spending. At the same time, we have not yet been able to deal with the limited availability of health care for some groups of the population and the ongoing shortage of medical personnel, especially nurses and doctors in pediatric clinics, general practitioners for adults and some specialist departments. The above is reflected in below-average results in indicators such as preventable deaths, life expectancy of men and women, or neonatal mortality.
The growth of health care expenses while stagnating in the improvement of the health status of the population points to the inefficiency of the Slovak health system. We have decided to examine the development of the efficiency of slovak health care system over the past 20 years and how Slovakia fared compared to other countries. Firstly, we have searched literature and secondly we have measured efficiency of our system using th Data Envelopment Analysis method. Thanks to international comparisons, we know that the Slovak healthcare system scores very poor in terms of efficiency and is regularly ranked at the bottom of comparisons with other OECD countries. According to the results of our DEA analysis, Slovakia was ranked 26th out of 30 countries in 2020. This is primarily due to very poor results in health indicators. The case of the neighboring Czech Republic is interesting. After 2000, Czechia held the leading places in the rankings of efficiency, but the sharp increase in healthcare spending from 5.7% in 2000 to 9.2% of GDP in 2020 was not reflected in an adequate increase in life expectancy or decrease in potentially lost years of life and therefore the efficiency of its health system has significantly decreased in recent years.
In the future, we see it as essential to ensure that, when spending on health care is increased, measures are adopted that will increase its efficiency and lead to an improvement in the health of the population.
Analysis available for download (slovak language only)
