About the optimality of competition among health-care providers.

Summary The purpose of this doctoral thesis is to evaluate the potential effects of increased competition in the health care market. It pays particular attention to the effects of competition on the allocative efficiency of the health care system in terms of health care and health expenditures. Taken together, our results suggest that the canonical effects of competition do not necessarily apply to the health care market, and detail circumstances in which increased competition could harm social welfare. This thesis consists of an introduction and three chapters (academic papers), each focusing on a different aspect of health system efficiency. The first chapter analyzes the impact of competition on hospital care practices and their regulation through prospective pricing. The second chapter details the regulatory issues related to the incomplete nature of patient information when choosing which care procedure to adopt, starting with the decision to implement additional diagnostic tests. The final chapter of this thesis discusses the possible consequences of the asymmetry that may exist between public and private care providers in terms of coverage obligations and can be applied to the market for home care for the elderly.