title: The physician/population ratio as a proxy measure of the adequacy of health care.
abstract: In the absence of service use and health status data at the individual level in most developing countries of the world, the utility of the physician/population ratio as a proxy measure of health service availability and use in health needs assessment is tested. Data from 60 predominantly developing countries show that the physician/population ratio is curvilinearly related to an indicator of population health status, namely infant mortality. When this relation is linearized by logarithmic transformations, the physician/population ratio accounts for 53% of the variance in infant mortality. There is no significant functional relationship between the physician/population ratio and infant mortality when state-level data in the US are analysed. Implications of these findings are discussed with respect to needs assessment in developing regions of the world.
mesh_terms: D003906:Developing Countries; D004812:Epidemiologic Methods; D006297:Health Services Accessibility; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007226:Infant Mortality; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D009726:Nurses / Q000600:supply & distribution; D010820:Physicians / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D014481:United States