Abstract:

Public and private health care in European countries has for decades been showing a chronic shortage of health professionals, especially physicians and nurses. Implemented governmental and departmental measures and policies aimed at securing necessary staffing for medical facilities are mostly based on economic factors - total financial expenditures on health care, wage levels, etc. Nevertheless, the shortage of healthcare workers remains a current health problem in most European countries. Based on this, the main goal of our analyses and research was to determine to what extent the economic instruments of Slovak government and departmental policies succeed in ensuring that medical facilities in the country are staffed by the required number of one of the most important categories of healthcare workers - physicians. Therefore, the subject of our analyses are trends in the number of doctors in healthcare facilities, state budget healthcare expenditures, and trends in remuneration and wages in healthcare facilities. Based on the analysis of statistical data, the causal links between the number of physicians in health care facilities and the named economic factors are justified. Using correlation analysis, the degree of influence of the named economic factors on securing the required staffing physician for medical facilities.