The goal of this study is to provide empirical evidence of the impact of nurse staffing levels on seven nursing-sensitive patient outcomes (NSPOs) at the hospital unit level. Combining a very large set of claims data from a German health insurer with mandatory quality reports published by every...

In response to increasing health expenditures and a high number of physician visits, the German government introduced a copayment for ambulatory care in 2004 for individuals with statutory health insurance (SHI). Because persons with private insurance were exempt from the copayments, this...

The main argument for the ongoing privatization process is that privatization will lead to an increase in efficiency, which has been confirmed by a large number of studies. An important argument against privatization is that privatization may lead to employment reductions. In the hospital...