The impact of health workforce and health expenditures on life expectancy and infant mortality rates in Turkiye

Abstract

Aims: This study examines the impact of the number of health personnel and health expenditures on life expectancy and infant mortality rates in Turkiye. The study's primary purpose is to determine the effect of increased health personnel and health expenditures on quality of life and infant mortality rates. Therefore, the impact of health personnel and expenses on life expectancy and infant mortality rates was investigated. It was analyzed how these variables shape the effectiveness of health services and how they affect public health. Methods: This study used multiple regression analysis to assess the effects of healthcare workforce and expenditures on health outcomes in Turkiye between 2001 and 2021. Life expectancy and infant mortality rate were dependent variables, while per capita healthcare expenditure, the number of doctors, and the number of nurses were used as independent variables. Data were obtained from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) databases and analyzed using the SPSS software. Results: The findings indicate that per capita healthcare expenditures positively and significantly affect life expectancy (B=0.015, p=0.016), suggesting that increases in healthcare spending contribute to longer life expectancy. Conversely, the effects of the number of doctors (B=-1.580, p=0.138) and nurses (B=0.232, p=0.400) were not statistically significant, indicating that workforce numbers alone may not directly impact life expectancy. Regarding infant mortality rate, healthcare expenditure (B=0.016, p=0.166) and doctor availability (B=-1.503, p=0.467) showed negative associations, while the number of nurses had a positive but non-significant association (B=0.407, p=0.457). Although these variables theoretically demonstrated the potential to reduce infant mortality rates, none of these effects reached statistical significance. The model explained 82.5% (R²=0.825) of the variance in life expectancy and 88.7% (R²=0.887) in infant mortality rate, underscoring the model's robustness in explaining variations in these health outcomes. Conclusion: The study findings suggest that while healthcare expenditures positively affect life expectancy, the number of healthcare workers alone is insufficient, and factors such as service quality and efficiency also play a role. In developing health policies, strategies should focus on systematically improving the quality of services rather than merely increasing the number of personnel. Particularly in rural and low-income areas, the scope and quality of healthcare services should be enhanced to reduce disparities in health indicators.

Keywords

• Health expenditures
• Life expectancy
• Infant mortality
• Regression analysis

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