{"title":"More doctors, better health? Consolidating evidence from Brazil's Mais Médicos program","authors":"Rudi Rocha","doi":"10.1016/j.socscimed.2024.117559","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In their paper “More Doctors, better health? A generalised synthetic control approach to estimating impacts of increasing doctors under Brazil's Mais Medicos Programme”, Thomas, Millett, Soares and Hone add novel empirical evidence on the effects of Brazil's Programa Mais Medicos (PMM) on population health outcomes, reinforcing evidence that PMM has had limited effects: while PMM improved healthcare access in underserved regions, results show little impact on more extreme outcomes, such as mortality. Here I collect and connect evidence from the Brazilian context to discuss three potential explanations that, <em>inter alia</em>, could help us better understand why evidence from Thomas et al. (2024) as well as from previous research efforts points to a weak relationship between physician supply and population health. The potential explanations include health production complexity, system adaptability, and the increasing challenge of managing chronic diseases, emphasizing the need for more integrated healthcare approaches.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49122,"journal":{"name":"Social Science & Medicine","volume":"364 ","pages":"Article 117559"},"PeriodicalIF":4.9000,"publicationDate":"2024-11-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Social Science & Medicine","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S027795362401013X","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
In their paper “More Doctors, better health? A generalised synthetic control approach to estimating impacts of increasing doctors under Brazil's Mais Medicos Programme”, Thomas, Millett, Soares and Hone add novel empirical evidence on the effects of Brazil's Programa Mais Medicos (PMM) on population health outcomes, reinforcing evidence that PMM has had limited effects: while PMM improved healthcare access in underserved regions, results show little impact on more extreme outcomes, such as mortality. Here I collect and connect evidence from the Brazilian context to discuss three potential explanations that, inter alia, could help us better understand why evidence from Thomas et al. (2024) as well as from previous research efforts points to a weak relationship between physician supply and population health. The potential explanations include health production complexity, system adaptability, and the increasing challenge of managing chronic diseases, emphasizing the need for more integrated healthcare approaches.
期刊介绍：
Social Science & Medicine provides an international and interdisciplinary forum for the dissemination of social science research on health. We publish original research articles (both empirical and theoretical), reviews, position papers and commentaries on health issues, to inform current research, policy and practice in all areas of common interest to social scientists, health practitioners, and policy makers. The journal publishes material relevant to any aspect of health from a wide range of social science disciplines (anthropology, economics, epidemiology, geography, policy, psychology, and sociology), and material relevant to the social sciences from any of the professions concerned with physical and mental health, health care, clinical practice, and health policy and organization. We encourage material which is of general interest to an international readership.
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