Economic implications of endovenous great saphenous ablation in a public health care system.

BACKGROUND: In mid-2007, endovenous ablation (EVA) of the great saphenous vein was introduced into the publicly funded health care system in Saskatchewan, Canada. We hypothesize that the introduction of EVA resulted in a decrease in use of high ligation and stripping (HL/S), decreased costs to the health care system, and increased demand of patients for great saphenous vein ablative procedures. METHODS: We retrospectively reviewed administrative data to capture cases of HL/S between 2003 and 2014 and cases of EVA of the great saphenous vein (endovenous laser treatment and radiofrequency ablation) between 2007 and 2014. Accounting for the change in practice pattern that occurred slowly between 2007 and 2009, we divided our patients into the pre-EVA era (2003-2006) and the post-EVA era (2010-2014). Procedure costs were determined with models used by our health region for this purpose. RESULTS: Utilization rates for great saphenous vein intervention remained similar in the pre-EVA (90 procedures per year) and post-EVA (92 procedures per year; P = .83) eras. Case costs of HL/S ($1965.12/case) were higher than those of EVA (endovenous laser treatment, $1295.08/case; radiofrequency ablation, $1410.54/case). The total annual costs of great saphenous vein intervention decreased from $176,861 in the pre-EVA era to $134,525 (P = .02). CONCLUSIONS: Introduction of publicly funded EVA has reduced rates of HL/S and reduced costs to our health system by approximately $42,000 per year, without increasing great saphenous vein intervention rates.

Regional Medicare Expenditures and Survival Among Older Women With Localized Breast Cancer.

BACKGROUND: Despite evidence on large variation in breast cancer expenditures across geographic regions, there is little understanding about the association between expenditures and patient outcomes. OBJECTIVES: To examine whether Medicare beneficiaries with nonmetastatic breast cancer living in regions with higher cancer-related expenditures had better survival. RESEARCH DESIGN: A retrospective cohort study of women with localized breast cancer from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results-Medicare linked database. Hospital referral regions (HRR) were categorized into quintiles based on risk-standardized per patient Medicare expenditures on initial phase of breast cancer care. Hierarchical generalized linear models were estimated to examine the association between patients' HRR quintile and survival. SUBJECTS: In total, 12,610 Medicare beneficiaries diagnosed with stage II-III breast cancer during 2005-2008 who underwent surgery. MEASURES: Outcome measures for our analysis were 3- and 5-year overall survival. RESULTS: Risk-standardized per patient Medicare expenditures on initial phase of breast cancer care ranged from $13,338 to $26,831 across the HRRs. Unadjusted 3- and 5-year survival varied from 66.7% to 92.2% and 50.0% to 84.0%, respectively, across the HRRs, but there was no significant association between HRR quintile and survival in bivariate analysis (P=0.08 and 0.28, respectively). After adjustment for sociodemographic and clinical characteristics, quintiles of regional cancer expenditures remained unassociated with patients' 3-year (P=0.35) and 5-year survival (P=0.20). Further analysis adjusting for treatment factors (surgery type and receipt of radiation and systemic therapy) and stratifying by cancer stage showed similar results. CONCLUSIONS: For Medicare beneficiaries with nonmetastatic breast cancer, residence in regions with higher breast cancer-related expenditures was not associated with better survival. More attention to value in breast cancer care is warranted.

Avaliação da produtividade de hospitais brasileiros pela metodologia do diagnosis related group (DRG) / Evaluation of the productivity of Brazilian hospitals by the methodology of diagnosis related group (DRG)

O gerenciamento de uma organização hospitalar exige provisionar seus custos/gastos com ferramentas que a aproximam da realidade. A tarefa de aferição da produtividade pode ser complexa e duvidosa, diversos métodos são experimentados e a utilização do DRG tem se mostrado eficiente, sendo utilizado na avaliação da produtividade através de desfechos assistenciais. Estudo transversal, avaliou 145.710 internações, no período de 2012-2014, utilizando a metodologia do DRG para medição de sua produtividade a partir da mediana do tempo de internação. Ao agruparmos todas as internações em clínicos (37,6%) e cirúrgicos (62,4%), várias análises puderam ser feitas de acordo com esse critério.O DRG como ferramenta para predição de dias de internação é uma alternativa eficiente, colaborando assim para o controle da produtividade que influencia diretamente nos gastos e custos dos produtos hospitalares e qualidade dos serviços.

The management requires a hospital organization to provision their costs/expenses with tools that approximate reality. The task of measuring productivity can be complex and uncertain, several methods are tested and the use of the DRG has been efficient, being used to assess the productivity through clinical outcomes. Cross-sectional study evaluated 145.710 hospitalizations in the period 2012-2014, using the DRG methodology for measuring productivity from the median length of hospitalization. When we group all hospitalizations in clinical (37.6%) and surgical (62.4%), multiple analyzes could be made according to this criterion. The DRG as a tool for prediction of hospital days is an effective alternative, thereby contributing tothe control of productivity that directly influences the costs of hospital expenses and product and service quality.

Incorporating efficiency in hospital-capacity planning in Germany.

Hospital occupancy is a key metric in hospital-capacity planning in Germany, even though this metric neglects important drivers of economic efficiency, for example treatment costs and case mix. We suggest an alternative metric, which incorporates economic efficiency explicitly, and illustrate how this metric can be used in the hospital-capacity planning cycle. The practical setting of this study is the hospital capacity planning process in the German federal state of Rheinland-Pfalz. The planning process involves all 92 acute-care hospitals of this federal state. The study is based on standard hospital data, including annual costs, number of cases--disaggregated by medical departments and ICD codes, respectively--length-of-stay, certified beds, and occupancy rates. Using the developed metric, we identified 18 of the 92 hospitals as inefficient and targets for over-proportional capacity cuts. On the upside, we identified 15 efficient hospitals. The developed model and analysis has affected the federal state's most recent medium term planning cycle.

Acute care hospital strategic priorities: perceptions of challenges, control, competition and collaboration in Ontario's evolving healthcare system.

To explore the current and pending strategic agenda of Ontario hospitals (the largest consumers of the provincial healthcare budget), a survey of Ontario acute care hospital CEOs was conducted in January 2004. The survey, with an 82% response rate, identifies 29 strategic priorities under seven key strategic themes consistent across different hospital types. These themes include (1) human resources cultivation, (2) service integration and partnerships, (3) consumer engagement, (4) corporate governance and management, (5) organizational efficiency and redesign, (6) improved information use for decision-making, (7) patient care management. The extent to which an individual hospital's control over strategic resolutions is perceived may affect multilevel strategic priority-setting and action-planning. In addition to supporting ongoing development of meaningful performance measures and information critical to strategic decision-making, this study's findings may facilitate a better understanding of hospitals' key resource commitments, the extent of competition and collaboration for key resources, the perceived degree of individual control over strategic issue resolution and where systemic resolutions may be required.

[Operational costs and control of performance in surgical clinics between marketing and planning economics. Risk or perhaps quadrature of the circle]. / Betriebswirtschaftliche Kosten- und Leistungsteuerung in chirurgischen Kliniken zwischen Markt- und Planwirtschaft. Riskanter Spagat oder gar Quadratur des Kreises.

Surgical hospitals can be seen as operational or even industrial production systems. Doctors have a major impact on both medical performance and costs. For active participation in the management process, knowledge of industrial controlling mechanisms is required. German hospitals currently receive no procedure-related financial revenues, such as prices or tariffs for defined medical treatment activities. Maximum clinical revenues are, furthermore, limited by principles of planned economy and can be increased only slightly by greater medical performance. Costs are the only target that can be autonomously influenced by the management. Operative controlling in hospitals aims at horizontal and vertical coordination of subunits and decentralization of process regulations. Hospital medical performance is not clearly defined, its quantitative measurement very problematic. Process-orientated clinical activities are not taken into account. A high percentage of hospital costs are fixed and can be influenced only by major structural interventions in the long term. Variable costs are primarily dependent on the quantity of clinical activities, but also heavily influenced by patient structure (comorbidity and risk profile). The various forms of industrial cost calculations, such as internal budgeting, internal markets or flexible plan-cost balancing, cannot be directly applied in hospital management. Based on these analyses, current operational concepts and strategic trends are listed to describe cost-management options in hospitals with focus on the German health reforms.

[Ambulatory surgery in Great Britain--an overview]. / Ambulante Chirurgie in Grossbritannien--eine Ubersicht.

Day surgery has been practised in Great Britain for many years. However, only in the last few years there has been a great surge of interest in the practice of day surgery. This has taken place despite many obstacles such as clinician's preference for more traditional approaches and initial lack of facilities and resources. Main reason for expansion of day surgery has been due to gradual change in clinical practice with new technology, search for cost efficiency, joint effort by policy makers and professionals and above all positive attitude of patients themselves towards treatment on a day care basis. In the last five years day surgery has nearly doubled in this country. Currently just under half of all elective operations are carried out on a day care basis in Great Britain. However, there is a wide variation in relation to performance of day surgery throughout the country between hospitals. This is true both for total number of surgical patients treated on a day care basis and for individual surgical procedures. Day surgery is now generally accepted as best option of treatment for over 50% of all elective surgical procedures and it is expected that by the end of this decade this figure is likely to be over 60%.

Invest in the long term.

Shrinking hospital resources have forced hospitals to develop ways to integrate their strategic, operational and financial goals. South Carolina's Richland Memorial Hospital has implemented such a plan.

Centro hospitalario nacional Bogota D.E. 1990 / National hospital center Bogota D.E. 1990

Proyecto de actualizacion e integracion de los hospitales universitarios de la facultad de medicina de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia que tiende a crear un modelo piloto para la reorganizacion cintifica, administrativa y tecnologica para la atencion de salud de la poblacion marginal del sur de Bogota, enmarcado dentro de las politicas estrategias y propositos del plan economico social del gobierno nacional, el plan de erradicacion de la pobreza absoluta e integrado a los planes de consolidacion del sistema nacional de salud. Propone como estrategias fundamentales la coordinacion de los recursos financieros de los hospitales involucrados para la actualizacion tecnologica; la creacion de una red de informacion para soportar los procesos administrativos, medico asistenciales, academicos y de investigacion, y la participacion de las facultades de salud, ciencias, ciencias humanas e ingenieria para desarrollar la educacion y los servicios a la comunidad. Se describen los aspectos financieros, las espectativas y la participacion de la universidad en el proyecto.

New equipment for 1989 capital budgets. A checklist of new technologies that may improve your hospital's competitive position.

With growing constraints on all categories of inpatient revenue, many hospitals face their tightest-ever capital budgets in 1989. Yet pressures continue for hospitals to acquire new technologies in order to remain competitive and attract patients and physicians. This summary of new technologies that many hospitals should be considering will aid in prioritizing capital budget requests.

The role of specialized clinical services in competition among hospitals.

Because duplication of services among hospitals can be costly, it is important to understand the circumstances under which duplication occurs among hospitals within a region. In this sample of 3,584 community hospitals surveyed in 1972, we analyzed the impact of competition on the availability of specialized clinical services, with special focus on mammography, emergency services, cobalt therapy, heart surgery, and cardiac catheterization. We found that the presence of nearby institutions and services increases the availability of most of these services in neighboring hospitals. This supports the hypothesis that competition among hospitals within an open-ended reimbursement environment takes the form of nonprice competition for community-based physicians through the acquisition of expensive clinical facilities.