IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/bushor/v55y2012i6p593-608.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Governance of primary healthcare practices: Australian insights

Author

Listed:
  • King, Robyn
  • Green, Peter

Abstract

Compared to other Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries, Australia fell to third in 2010 in terms of health system performance, ranking behind the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. The Australian government believes that primary healthcare practices in particular have not changed sufficiently over time to keep achieving higher levels of performance. One area of concern within healthcare practices is the impact of governance structures on practices’ various performance metrics. Indeed, studies investigating the combination of attributes of high-performing healthcare systems appear to be rare in the literature. This study is a first attempt to address this situation. It reports an exploratory case-based investigation conducted with seven primary healthcare practices in Australia. Its major insights include that higher-performing practices have more hierarchical, complex, but well-defined governance structures. Furthermore, higher-performing practices also appear to be characterized by having a managing general practitioner responsible for the ‘business of the practice.’ Moreover, higher-performing practices seem to be able to produce clearly documented position descriptions indicating explicit duties and lines of accountability for both medical and administrative staff.

Suggested Citation

  • King, Robyn & Green, Peter, 2012. "Governance of primary healthcare practices: Australian insights," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 55(6), pages 593-608.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:bushor:v:55:y:2012:i:6:p:593-608
    DOI: 10.1016/j.bushor.2012.07.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0007681312001152
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.bushor.2012.07.006?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert Rosenman & Daniel Friesner, 2004. "Scope and scale inefficiencies in physician practices," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(11), pages 1091-1116, November.
    2. repec:mpr:mprres:3658 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Richard M. Scheffler, 1975. "Further Considerations on the Economics of Group Practice: The Management Input," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 10(2), pages 258-263.
    4. N/A, 2007. "Economic Overview," National Institute Economic Review, National Institute of Economic and Social Research, vol. 200(1), pages 2-3, April.
    5. Lisa C. DeFelice & W. David Bradford, 1997. "Relative inefficiencies in production between solo and group practice physicians," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 6(5), pages 455-465, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ali Uyar & Cemil Kuzey & Merve Kilic & Abdullah S. Karaman, 2021. "Board structure, financial performance, corporate social responsibility performance, CSR committee, and CEO duality: Disentangling the connection in healthcare," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 28(6), pages 1730-1748, November.
    2. Catia Milena Lopes & Annibal José Scavarda & Mauricio Nunes Macedo de Carvalho & André Luis Korzenowski, 2018. "The Business Model and Innovation Analyses: The Sustainable Transition Obstacles and Drivers for the Hospital Supply Chains," Resources, MDPI, vol. 8(1), pages 1-17, December.
    3. Phares, Jonathan & Dobrzykowski, David D. & Prohofsky, Jodi, 2021. "How policy is shaping the macro healthcare delivery supply chain: The emergence of a new tier of retail medical clinics," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 64(3), pages 333-345.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Matthias Staat, 2011. "Estimating the efficiency of general practitioners controlling for case mix and outlier effects," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 40(2), pages 321-342, April.
    2. Lukas Kwietniewski & Mareike Heimeshoff & Jonas Schreyögg, 2017. "Estimation of a physician practice cost function," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 18(4), pages 481-494, May.
    3. Filipe Amado, Carla Alexandra & Dyson, Robert G., 2008. "On comparing the performance of primary care providers," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 185(3), pages 915-932, March.
    4. Matthieu Cassou & Julien Mousquès & Carine Franc, 2020. "General practitioners’ income and activity: the impact of multi-professional group practice in France," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 21(9), pages 1295-1315, December.
    5. Lukas Kwietniewski & Jonas Schreyögg, 2018. "Efficiency of physician specialist groups," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 21(3), pages 409-425, September.
    6. Daniel Friesner & Matthew McPherson & Robert Rosenman, 2006. "Are Hospitals Seasonally Inefficient? Evidence from Washington State Hospitals," Working Papers 2006-3, School of Economic Sciences, Washington State University.
    7. Lukas Kwietniewski & Jonas Schreyögg, 2018. "Profit efficiency of physician practices: a stochastic frontier approach using panel data," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 21(1), pages 76-86, March.
    8. Margherita Neri & Patricia Cubi-Molla & Graham Cookson, 2022. "Approaches to Measure Efficiency in Primary Care: A Systematic Literature Review," Applied Health Economics and Health Policy, Springer, vol. 20(1), pages 19-33, January.
    9. Dan Friesner & Robert Roseman & Matthew McPherson, 2008. "Are hospitals seasonally inefficient? Evidence from Washington State," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 40(6), pages 699-723.
    10. Rajitkanok Puenpatom & Robert Rosenman, 2008. "Efficiency of Thai provincial public hospitals during the introduction of universal health coverage using capitation," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 11(4), pages 319-338, December.
    11. Strumpf, Erin & Ammi, Mehdi & Diop, Mamadou & Fiset-Laniel, Julie & Tousignant, Pierre, 2017. "The impact of team-based primary care on health care services utilization and costs: Quebec’s family medicine groups," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 76-94.
    12. Mareike Heimeshoff & Jonas Schreyögg & Lukas Kwietniewski, 2014. "Cost and technical efficiency of physician practices: a stochastic frontier approach using panel data," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 17(2), pages 150-161, June.
    13. Jean-Pierre Lachaud, 2007. "Les déterminants de l'inactivité économique et de la non-scolarisation des enfants aux Comores et à Madagascar. Existe-t-il une courbe de Kuznets ?," Documents de travail 140, Groupe d'Economie du Développement de l'Université Montesquieu Bordeaux IV.
    14. Bryant, Toba & Raphael, Dennis & Schrecker, Ted & Labonte, Ronald, 2011. "Canada: A land of missed opportunity for addressing the social determinants of health," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 101(1), pages 44-58, June.
    15. Denis, Alain & Mergaert, Lut & Fostier, Christel & Cleemput, Irina & Simoens, Steven, 2010. "A comparative study of European rare disease and orphan drug markets," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 97(2-3), pages 173-179, October.
    16. Sisira Sarma & Rose Anne Devlin & William Hogg, 2010. "Physician's production of primary care in Ontario, Canada," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 19(1), pages 14-30, January.
    17. Pal, Govind, 2009. "Impact of Scientific Lac Cultivation Training on Lac Economy – A Study in Jharkhand," Agricultural Economics Research Review, Agricultural Economics Research Association (India), vol. 22(1), January.
    18. Andrew Worthington, 1999. "An Empirical Survey Of Frontier Efficiency Measurement Techniques In Healthcare Services," School of Economics and Finance Discussion Papers and Working Papers Series 067, School of Economics and Finance, Queensland University of Technology.
    19. Augurzky, Boris & Engel, Dirk & Schmidt, Christoph M. & Schwierz, Christoph, 2009. "Ownership and Financial Performance in the German Hospital Sector," Ruhr Economic Papers 123, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    20. Carmen De-Pablos-Heredero & Carlos Fernández-Renedo & Jose-Amelio Medina-Merodio, 2015. "Technical Efficiency and Organ Transplant Performance: A Mixed-Method Approach," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-20, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:bushor:v:55:y:2012:i:6:p:593-608. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/bushor .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.