The Medicine Education Investment Evaluation Methods

Development of health care system and effectiveness and efficiency of health care services is increasingly dependent on the investments of human resources thus preserving and educating intellectual capital. Many research studies proved the importance of educational investments as the factor to develop partial sectors in economy. The education becomes one of the relevant production factors whose allocations can be considered as implemented investments. Once the education is treated as an investment subject, the efficiency of these investments must be analysed, as well. The goal of our paper is to present a set of analytical data connected with economic value of education and career preparation in health care. Brief theoretical part of this paper highlights the general theory of the different educational investment evaluation methods. In scientific literature there are two main groups of investment project efficient evaluation; static and dynamic methods. In static project efficiency evaluation methods time price is not taken into account whereas in dynamic methods discount is a necessary pre-requisite. To apply these methods it is necessary to identify money flows, i.e., to determine costs in-curred and benefits obtained. The analytical part applies investment efficiency evaluation method on educational investments in health care (for example, physician education) in Slovakia. The study uses a quantitative approach to investigate the research question and analyzes the original collected survey data from our own research. When talking about education costs and benefit, it is necessary to assess not only the social or costs incurred and benefits obtained by an individual, but also benefits obtained and costs in- -curred by the state. The expenses dedicated to acquire education and competences in medicine should be considered as a special investment field. The evaluation of these investments‘ efficiency will assist in effective earnings system in health care development. For efficiency evaluation of educational investments modified models of discounted money flows can be applied.