Health care needs and resources distribution: how to allocate financial resources in primary care trust?

Abstract

Making a good allocation of the resources available is crucial to ensure a good operation of the system. In Portugal the allocation of resources in Primary Care Trust was made, mainly by historical values. In the last year, the Central Administration of the Health System proposed a new way of allocating the financial resources in Primary Care Trust. The goal of this study is to find different possibilities for allocating the financial resources in Primary Care in Portugal. We use data from the Central Administration of the Health System. The Proposal uses linear and quantile regressions, having the per capita costs as a dependent variable. Finally, it was decided on what rule would be better, looking at an economical and statistical criterion.