Health Economics Research Program
The aim of the Health Economics Research Program is to conduct high quality and policy relevant research across a number of areas of applied health economics. Research is funded from competitive external grants from ARC, NHMRC, State and Commonwealth governments, and other sources. We also host the NHMRC-funded Centre for Research Excellence in Medical Workforce Dynamics, incorporating the Medicine in Australia: Balancing Employment and Life (MABEL) longitudinal survey of doctors.
We are part of the broader University of Melbourne Health Economics Group (UMHEG), which includes others working in health economics from the:
- Department of Economics;
- Centre for Health Policy - Melbourne School of Population and Global Health;
- Nossal Institute for Global Health and;
- researchers from the labour and education economics research programs within the Melbourne Institute.
The Health Economics Research Program has a strong international record of health economics research in the following areas:
- Health care workforce and health professionals labour markets.
- Health insurance and health care finance.
- Performance, incentives and competition in health care.
- The economics of primary health care services.
- Socio-economic determinants of health.
These are under-researched areas of work within Australia and internationally, as well as being highly policy relevant. The methods used in these areas include the interrogation of large datasets using econometric techniques, through to the collection of data using specially designed surveys and experiments.