Health Affairs

Health Affairs, 27, no. 4 (2008): 949-951 doi: 10.1377/hlthaff.27.4.949 © 2008 by Project HOPE	New Online   Getting Health Reform Done   After the State of the Union   Incremental Reform   E-Health in Developing World   Most-Read Articles in 2009

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Perspective

PERSPECTIVE

When Incentives And Professionalism Collide

William C. Hsiao

As Jin Ma and colleagues observe, an unfettered market approach in China has reduced access to care, increased patients’ financial burden, and reduced emphasis on prevention and may have caused declines in quality and outcomes. A major driving force was that perverse incentives altered physicians’ behavior toward self-interest at the expense of patients, even where professional ethics dictated otherwise. Other nations, including India, are grappling with the profit motive and its consequences. Chinese leaders are attempting to deal with these problems by expanding public investment and reducing perverse incentives. However, profit motives remain a powerful, potentially offsetting feature of a reformed system.

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