Incentivized Peer Referrals for Tuberculosis Screening: Evidence from India

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Goldberg, J. E. S. S. I. C. A.; Macis, M. A. R. I. O.; Chintagunta, P. R. A. D. E. E. P.
• 署名单位: University System of Maryland; University of Maryland College Park; Johns Hopkins University; University of Chicago
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL-APPLIED ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1945-7782
• DOI: 10.1257/app.20200721
• 发表日期: 2023
• 页码: 259-291
• 关键词: health-services; hiv; networks; inference; patient; IMPACT

摘要

We study whether and how peer referrals increase screening, testing, and identification of patients with tuberculosis, an infectious disease responsible for over one million deaths annually. In an experiment with 3,176 patients at 122 tuberculosis treatment centers in India, we find that small financial incentives raise the probability that existing patients refer prospective patients for screening and testing, result-ing in cost-effective identification of new cases. Incentivized referrals operate through two mechanisms: peers have private information about individuals in their social networks to target for outreach, and they are more effective than health workers in inducing these individ-uals to get tested. (JEL H51, I12, I18, O15, Z13)