Cost analysis in family planning: operations research projects and beyond.
Genevieve M. Kenney, Lewis Ma · PubMed · 1991
This paper addresses the relevance of cost analysis to operations research (OR) projects on family planning. First the paper explains the importance of cost analysis in OR project. Second it attempts to define financial economic and resource costs. Third it describes 3 innovative approaches to cost analysis. With overall increases in the demand for family planning and declines government resources cost and resource allocation have become increasingly important. Cost analysis within OR projects allows programs to maximize the impact of scarce resources and meet the increasing demand for services. But as the authors point out while the conceptual view of cost is straightforward the practical aspects of measuring and defining cost are often difficult and confusing. The authors examine the 3 concepts in cost analysis (economic financial and resource cost) and point out the complications that arise in practice -- nontraceable costs the need to control for quality the issue of measuring demand and the importance of the scale of operation. While most cost analysis OR projects employ data from controlled experiments such studies can have several disadvantages including the fact that they can be costly that they can blur research and implementation costs and that the findings may not carry over when implemented on a large scale. The authors describe 3 recent methods for measuring and analyzing costs that can enhance OR projects: the multivariate analysis (hedonic) the measurement of economic costs and quality and the cost-benefit analysis (TIPPS). Finally they highlight issues in need of attention and provide specific recommendations for expanding the scope of cost analysis in family planning and making cost-effectiveness analysis more relevant to policy needs.