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. 2008;6(2-3):487-500.
doi: 10.1162/JEEA.2008.6.2-3.487.

PUTTING A BAND-AID ON A CORPSE: INCENTIVES FOR NURSES IN THE INDIAN PUBLIC HEALTH CARE SYSTEM

Abhijit V Banerjee  1 , Rachel Glennerster, Esther Duflo
Affiliations

PUTTING A BAND-AID ON A CORPSE: INCENTIVES FOR NURSES IN THE INDIAN PUBLIC HEALTH CARE SYSTEM

Abhijit V Banerjee et al. J Eur Econ Assoc. 2008.

Abstract

The public Indian health care system is plagued by high staff absence, low effort by providers, and limited use by potential beneficiaries who prefer private alternatives. This artice reports the results of an experiment carried out with a district administration and a nongovernmental organization (NGO). The presence of government nurses in government public health facilities (subcenters and aid-posts) was recorded by the NGO, and the government took steps to punish the worst delinquents. Initially, the monitoring system was extremely effective. This shows that nurses are responsive to financial incentives. But after a few months, the local health administration appears to have undermined the scheme from the inside by letting the nurses claim an increasing number of "exempt days." Eighteen months after its inception, the program had become completely ineffective.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Presence of regular ANM, random checks.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Additional ANM present, two-ANM centers, random checks.
Figure 3
Figure 3
ANM attendance according to official records, monitored days.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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    1. Banerjee Abhijit, Duflo Esther. Addressing Absence. Journal of Economic Perspectives. 2006;20(1):117–132. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Banerjee Abhijit, Duflo Esther, Glennerster Rachel. Putting a Band-Aid on a Corpse: Nurse Incentives in the Indian Public Health Care System. Working paper, MIT 2007 - PMC - PubMed

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