Uma proposta de avaliação da eficiência operacional do sistema público de saúde municipal por meio da análise envoltória de dados (DEA)

Abstract

In Brazil, health is considered a fundamental human right. The country has a well-defined health policy based on a single, universal and free system. Even so, health is pointed out as one of the great problems of the country. Public services depend on the combination of human, material and technological resources and it is important to know how these resources are being used and whether they are evenly distributed among the community. Health resources are limited and need adequate management so that they are well utilized and provide quality care. The need to achieve greater efficiency in public spending has motivated the development of methods and tools for decision-making and evaluation of public policies in the country. Assessing the current public health scenario helps in the elaboration of new actions, aiming to improve the performance of the community service. One of the tools that has shown great value in the evaluation of public services is Data Envelopment Analysis. This non-parametric method establishes the efficiency frontier through mathematical optimization programming and does not require specification of the functional relationships between the various inputs and outputs. This research proposes an evaluation of the resources available for health in the municipality of Bagé, Rio Grande do Sul and the way they are distributed among health posts, through the application of Data Envelopment Analysis. Eighteen basic health units were evaluated according to some pertinent variables to the method and it was stated that only six of these units are considered efficient by both pure technical efficiency and total efficiency. In addition, the results indicate which units operate below capacity and the targets for these units to reach the efficiency frontier.