The medical doctors as gatekeepers in the sickness insurance?

Per Engström and Per Johansson

No 2010:4, Working Paper Series, Center for Labor Studies from Uppsala University, Department of Economics

Abstract: Based on a randomised experiment we estimate effects from notification to medical doctors of tighter monitoring of their medical certificates. Both time prescribed by the doctor certificates for sick leave (prescribed sick leave) and the impact on the length of the actual sickness absence (actual sick leave) is studied. We find no effect on the total number of prescribed sick leave days. We do, however, find an increase in both prescribed and actual sick leave with a 25 percent work inability. We also find that the notification letter causes an increase in actual sick leave (i.e. the number of reimbursed sick days). We discuss a number of potential explanations for this rather surprising result.

Keywords: monitoring; moral hazard; public social insurance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C93 H51 H55 J22 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 35 pages
Date: 2009-06-01
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Related works:
Journal Article: The medical doctors as gatekeepers in the sickness insurance? (2012)
Working Paper: The medical doctors as gatekeepers in the sickness insurance? (2011)
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