Implication of E-Health and IT Governance on Healthcare Expenditure

Abstract

This paper analyzes the public healthcare expenditure of Middle Eastern countries in relation to different exogenous explanatory variables, through a panel study involving twelve (12) Middle East countries. More specifically, the study methodology uses panel cointegration, and panel-based error correction models derived from annual data covering the period of 2000 to 2010. The empirical results support a short-run co-integration relationship after allowing for the heterogeneous country effect. The long-run relationship is estimated using a full-modified OLS. The results of a ten-year panel study have been interpreted and commented. The public healthcare expenditure of our countries is explicated to a great extent by the single country GDP. Other strong correlation variables were found also to be statistically significant. The research reveals that e-health programming and e-health governance could lead to a decrease in unnecessary health care expenditure.