An econometric study of costs of teaching and research in Finnish hospitals

Abstract

In this study we used stochastic frontier cost functions to estimate the teaching and research costs of Finnish hospitals. Average and marginal cost estimates were used to evaluate the current reimbursement system as well as to calculate the total expenditure on teaching and research in hospitals. The efficiency adjustment had significant impact on the marginal and average cost estimates of the teaching and research output. The main policy implication of this study is that university teaching hospitals are able to produce both teaching and research output at significantly lower marginal and average incremental costs than other hospitals. According to our results 55% of the total state reimbursement budget for teaching and research (FIM 665 million) should be allocated to teaching and 45% to research.