Comparison of DEA Models Relating e-Health and Hospital Efficiency

Abstract

An industry that is under pressure to radically improve its efficiency performance is healthcare. In this paper, we examine the impact of e-health systems upon hospital efficiency. According to our methodology and since e-health has a broad meaning, an e-health system is defined as a set of at least the following practices: (i) the use of a hospital information system, (ii) the use of electronic health records, (iii) the implementation of an e-procurement policy, and, (iv) a human resource development policy for e-health. The literature points out that one of the most appropriate methodologies for assessing the efficiency of healthcare providers is Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). Implementing two different models, i.e., normal DEA and system differentiated DEA, the results indicate that in both cases the proportion of the efficient hospitals is more than double in favor of the hospitals that use e-health systems.