How Do Physicians Respond to New Medical Research?

Philip DeCicca, Maripier Isabelle and Natalie Malak
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Philip DeCicca

No 32656, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: What happens when the findings of a prominent medical study are overturned? Using a medical trial on breech births, we estimate the effect of the reversal of such a medical study on physician choices and infant health outcomes. Using the United States Birth Certificate Records from 1995-2010, we employ a difference-in-differences estimator for C-sections, low Apgar, and low birth weight measures. We find that the reversal of a multi-site, high profile, randomized control trial on the appropriate delivery of term breech births, the Term Breech Trial (TBT), led to a 15-23 percent decline in C-sections for such births at a time when the overall trend in C-sections was rising. We find our largest estimated effects amongst traditionally disadvantaged groups. However, we do not find that such a change in practice had significant impacts on infant health. Contrary to prior studies, we find that physicians updated their beliefs quickly, and do indeed adjust to new medical research, particularly young physicians, prior to mandatory policy or professional guidelines.

JEL-codes: I11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea
Note: EH
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published as Philip DeCicca & Maripier Isabelle & Natalie Malak, 2024. "How do physicians respond to new medical research?," Health Economics, vol 33(10), pages 2206-2228.

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w32656.pdf (application/pdf)
Access to the full text is generally limited to series subscribers, however if the top level domain of the client browser is in a developing country or transition economy free access is provided. More information about subscriptions and free access is available at http://www.nber.org/wwphelp.html. Free access is also available to older working papers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nbr:nberwo:32656

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w32656
The price is Paper copy available by mail.

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().