Yasmin Abbas[1], Diana Bowser[2], Can Erbil[3], Cagdas Sirin[4]
Abstract
The Turkish Health System underwent several evolutions from the early days of the Republic until the beginning of 1990s. The most radical changes came after 1990s in the context of reforms implemented within Turkey’s accession process to European Union.
The Turkish Health System has been restructured again in 2003 under the “Health Transformation Program” (HTP).
The aim of this study is to evaluate the impact of the introduction of the family medicine scheme (FM), one of the core components of the changes that are implemented through the HTP.
The pilot family medicine practice started in a small town, Düzce, in 2005 and gradually covered all 81 provinces of Turkey by the end of 2010. This gradual expansion and recently matured dataset creates a unique opportunity to empirically analyze the effect of this policy reform on health expenditure and health outcomes. Models utilized to conduct the analysis are differences-in-differences and as well as other panel data techniques.
Preliminary analysis indicates that FM has increased the health expenditure as well as the access to the health.
The paper also compares the FM experience and outcome in Egypt to the Turkish case and offers an array of policy recommendations.
Keyword: family medicine, Turkey, health
JEL Category: I18, I11
[1] Brandeis University, Heller School for Social Policy and Management
[2] Brandeis University, Heller School for Social Policy and Management
[3] Brandeis University, Heller School for Social Policy and Management and International Business School and EcoMod Network
[4] Bahçeşehir University, Graduate School of Social Sciences