The impact of hospital indicators on the number of recovering patients in selected OECD countries: A panel data analysis

The aim of this study is to measure the effect of hospital indicators on the number of recovering patients. However, giving suggestions to improve the health service process is among the sub-objectives of the research. Within the research purpose, three models were designed in the study. The models in question are named as healthcare providers, treatment services and institution model in accordance with the variables included in each model. In this regard, a health care provider model has been designed to analyze the effects of the number of doctor (lndoctor), nurse (lnnurse), and midwive (lnmidwive) on the number of recovering patients(lnrecoveringpatient). A treatment services model was designed to analyze the effects of bed occupancy rate (lnbedoccupancy), average length of stay (ln averagestay), average length of stay of a patient (lnpatientaveragestay) on the number of recovering patients (lnrecoveringpatient). An institution model was also designed to analyze the effects of the number of hospitals (lnhospital) and the number of beds (lnbed) on the number of recovering patients (lnrecoveringpatient). The designed models have been designed by the authors of the study, taking into account the literature and considering that will guide the future studies. The population of the research consists of OECD countries. The sample is nine OECD countries (Canada, Israel, Slovenia, Turkey, Germany, France, Slovakia, Luxembourg, Netherlands) in the universe. The countries included in the study were determined according to the availability of data on the variables used in the study. The three models designed were analyzed based on the 2003-2019 period. The data that used in the study were included in the analysis by taking their natural logarithms. Research data were tested with Eviews 10.0, Gauss 6.0 and Stata 12.0 packages. In this direction, the data that used in the study were analyzed with cross-sectional dependence, homogeneity, panel unit root, LM, CCE, AMG and panel causality tests. According to the results of the research, while the increase in the number of physicians increases the number of recovering patients, the increase in the number of nurses decreases the number of recovering patients. In addition, it was concluded that the bed occupancy rate increased the number of patients who recovered. According to the results of the Emirmahmutoğlu and Köse (2011) causality test, a one-way causality relationship was found from the number of midwives to the number of nurses for the health care provider model. In the treatment services model, a one-way causality relation was found from the average length of stay in hospital to the bed occupancy rate. For the institution model, there was no causality relationship between the variables.