数学中国w, madio,net Evaluation and Improvement of healthcare Systems 115 Financial resources include three aspects The percentage of GDP spent on healthcare The percentage of total government expenditure spent on healthcare. The ratio of governme ding to private spending on health. Apparently, in a good health system this ratio is high. Performance Health level. The main objective of a health system is improving health [WHO 2001]. We choose disability-adjusted life expectancy(DALE) and infant mortality as criteria, the combination of which can be used to evaluate the level of health Disability-adjusted life expectancy. dale is the life expectancy at birth adjusted for disability [IWHO2001]. It is a comprehensive mea sure of the global burden of disease and the trends of population health level [Mathers et aL. 2001 Infant mortality rates. Infant mortality rate is a significant indicator of medical level: High-medical-level countries have a low infant mortality rate Health-service coverage. Health-service coverage comprises several fac- ors, such as the immunization coverage of 1-year-olds and the percent- age of the population with pu ublic insurance A good health system should provide healthcare for all ofits citizens. Usually, developed coun- tries have high rates in the both of those Responsiveness. Responsiveness measures how the system performs relative to non-health aspects, meeting or not meeting a population,s expectation of how it should be treated [WHO 2001]. The notion of responsiveness is composed of seven elements, including [WHO 2001] respect for dignity, confidentiality, autonomy to participate in choices about ones own health, prompt attention, amenities of adequate quality access to social support networks, and freedom to select which individual or organization delivers ones The seven points above lead to a general metric of responsiveness. In part II we discuss how to combine them.数学中国 www.madio.net