Evidence map›Paper›PMID 42656209›Full record

ArticleFrontiers in public health2026

Allocative inefficiency in physician workforce distribution: specialty-level NHI-covered reimbursement analysis in South Korea's single-payer system.

Sun-Cheol Kim, Je-Il Ryu

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Frontiers in public health, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
0citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

0 citing papers in PubMed.

No citing paper in PubMed yet.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

2 authors.

Sun-Cheol KimGraduate School of Business, Hanyang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
Je-Il RyuGraduate School of Business, Hanyang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Background: About 52 million residents are insured under the single-payer National Health Insurance (NHI) of South Korea. Twenty-six board-certified clinical specialties practice under this system, yet specialty-level matching between physician manpower and NHI-financed workload has not been reported. Methods: This study is an ecological cross-sectional analysis using specialty ( Results: Per-specialist reimbursement was 52.5 million KRW (approximately USD 40,000) in radiology ( Conclusion: Across 2 study years, the 50.8-fold gap between these two specialties did not narrow. This dispersion, which reflects NHI-financed resource consumption rather than physician effort alone, is the principal finding. A statistically detectable link between trainee competition and NHI reimbursement was not observed; the secondary correlation test was underpowered, and its null result is not evidence of no association. These findings provide a specialty-level reimbursement baseline for South Korea's workforce allocation debate.

Indexed as

National Health ProgramsPhysiciansSingle-Payer SystemSpecializationCross-Sectional StudiesHumansRepublic of KoreaWorkloadallocative inefficiencyhealth policyhealth workforcenational health insurancephysician incentive plansRepublic of Korearesidency trainingsingle-payer system

Identifiers

PMID42656209
PMCPMC13506305

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.