The Consumption of Medical Care and the Evaluation of Efficiency

The Regional Office for Europe of the World Health Organisation, with the agreement of the Regional Committee, included in its programme a study of the methods of examining the efficiency of medical care. To advise on the organisation of the study, the Regional Director convened, in December I963, a small group of senior public health specialists interested in different aspects of the problem. In its report the group recommended that, as part of the main study, a separate study should be undertaken dealing with the 'consumption of medical care'. This paper reports the result of this consultant survey and gives a short bibliography of studies published in this field, mainly in Europe. It concentrates on consumption studies directly or fairly closely concerned with evaluation of the services.