HEALTH-CARE PRIORITIES AS A PROBLEM OF LOCAL RESOURCE-ALLOCATION

The aim of this study was to examine attitudes to prioritization in he alth care among the general public, politicians, doctors and nurses. T he focus in this paper is on the types of services from a perspective that is 'policy analytical'. This study forms part of the wider 'Prior itization in Health Care Project' carried out at the University of Kuo pio exploring patient treatment level prioritizations. Data were colle cted by a postal questionnaire in 1995. Four groups were established f or the study: (1) a general public sample of 2000 subjects, (2) a rand om sample of 1000 nurses, (3) a random sample of 1500 medical doctors and (4) a sample of 2200 politicians involved in social and health car e administration. Respondents were asked to make value choices between specialized and primary health care services in a real budget situati on. One of the most salient findings in this study was that attitudes towards priorities are context-dependent. Certain differences were obs erved between the groups studied. The attitudes of the general public and nurses were quite similar, while similar views were shared by poli ticians and doctors. The attitudes of the respondents reflect well wha t has actually happened in Finnish health care, with the exception of psychiatric services which have undergone drastic cuts. (C) 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.