This paper presents a new stochastic frontier model for panel data. The model takes into account firm unobservable heterogeneity and short-run and long-run sources of inefficiency. Each of these features is modeled by a specific random effect. In this way, firms’ latent heterogeneity is not...

We study the presence and the magnitudes of trade-offs between health outcomes and hospitals' efficiency using a data set from Lombardy, Italy, for the period 2008–2011. Our goal is to analyze whether the pressures for cost containment may affect hospital performance in terms of population...

Policy makers have made several attempts to limit hospitals upcoding. We investigate the impact on discharges with and without complications of a law introducing a minimum length of stay to discharges with complications. We implement a DID econometric model to assess the impact of the law and a...

This paper investigates the efficiency of Italian hospitals during the period 1998–2007 and consider the impact of some DRG distortions like uocoding, cream skimming and readmission. We apply both a stochastic frontier approach and a multilevel model. We show that readmissions are the most...

This paper considers the estimation of Kumbhakar et al. (J Prod Anal. doi:<ExternalRef> <RefSource>10.1007/s11123-012-0303-1</RefSource> <RefTarget Address="10.1007/s11123-012-0303-1" TargetType="DOI"/> </ExternalRef>, <CitationRef CitationID="CR30">2012</CitationRef>) (KLH) four random components stochastic frontier (SF) model using MLE techniques. We derive the log-likelihood function of the model using results from the closed-skew normal...</citationref></refsource></externalref>

In this paper we analyze the effects of some distortions induced by the prospective payment system, i.e. upcoding, cream skimming and readmissions, on hospitals' technical efficiency. We estimate a production function using a population-based dataset composed by all active hospitals in an...