Alternative physician payment methods: incentives, efficiency, and National Health Insurance.

Physicians are the dominant group in our health care system. Their decisions often influence the ways by which society's resources are used to achieve and maintain health. But physicians are also social and economic beings; their behavior is, in part, determined by the way they are reimbursed. Reimbursement methods and physician preferences interact on important medical care variables: utilization of services; treatment setting; practice location and specialty choice; and the efficiency of an individual physician's practice.