When women take over: physician gender and health care provision

Description

The share of female physicians has tripled in recent decades. While studies show that female and male physicians differ, we know little about the effect of physician gender on health care provision. We exploit quasi-random assignment of physicians to patients to estimate the causal effect of female physicians. Using Austrian register data and a difference-in-differences strategy we find that, if patients are assigned a female physician, they are more likely to switch physicians. This leads to a gender gap in revenues among physicians. Patients who stay with their female physician incur lower physician fees, driven by a decrease in health screenings.

Period	06 Sept 2024
Event title	Conference of the European Association of Labor Economists
Event type	Conference
Location	NorwayShow on map