Analysis of Short-Term Changes in Health Spending in CEE Countries: Creeping Trend Estimation

In this study we analyse short term changes in current health care expenditures (CHCE) in Central East European countries and test the applicability of a creeping trend in a short-term CHCE forecasting. The research sample includes: Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovak Republic. Data, obtained from OECD Health Data Database, covers the years 1995–2014. We employ the creeping trend method with constant segment 4. Our results show, that CHCE p.c. time series are non-stationary in all analysed countries, as well as in EU as a whole. Our study also confirms the existence of a positive relationship between CHCE and GDP but analysis of II differences suggest, that all countries face alternating periods of a slowdown or an acceleration of CHCE p.c. growth or decline. Particularly, in the period 2008–2010, there is an important slowdown of the CHCE growth. Although in a long term there is an expectation of constant increase in CHCE, in the short term CHCE are subject to significant fluctuations, responding to changes dynamics of GDP. We also confirm, that using creeping trend method as a forecasting tool, may lead to very high fitting measures with R² close to 0.99 for each of selected countries.