Assigning Israeli medical graduates to internships

Israel Journal of Health Policy Research

Anda Massler⁵  Ayal Hassidim¹  Rony Shreberk²  Assaf Romm⁴  Arnon Afek³  Avinatan Hassidim⁶  Slava Bronfman⁶ 

[1]Shaare Zedek Medical Center, Jerusalem, Israel

[2]Hadassah - Hebrew University Medical Center, Jerusalem, Israel

[3]Ministry of Health and Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv, Israel

[4]Harvard Business School, Cambridge, MA, United States

[5]Schneider Children’s Medical Center, Petach-Tikvah, Israel

[6]Department of Computer Science, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel

关键词: Medical graduates;    Israel;    Market design;    Lottery;    Internship;   

Others  :  1177425
DOI  :  10.1186/2045-4015-4-6

 received in 2014-11-26, accepted in 2015-01-13,  发布年份 2015

【 摘 要 】

Background

Physicians in Israel are required to do an internship in an accredited hospital upon completion of the medical studies, and prior to receiving the medical license. For most students, the assignment is determined by a lottery, which takes into consideration the preferences of these students.

Objectives

We propose a novel way to perform this lottery, in which (on average) a larger number of students gets one of their top choices. We report about implementing this method in the 2014 Internship Lottery in Israel.

Methods

The new method is based on calculating a tentative lottery, in which each student has some probability of getting to each hospital. Then a computer program “trades” between the students, where trade is performed only if it is beneficial to both sides. This trade creates surplus, which translates to more students getting one of their top choices.

Results

The average student improved his place by 0.91 seats.

Conclusions

The new method can improve the welfare of medical graduates, by giving them more probability to get to one of their top choices. It can be applied in internship markets in other countries as well.

【 授权许可】

   
2015 Bronfman et al.; licensee BioMed Central.

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