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A comprehensive business continuity plan can prepare an organization for unforeseen circumstances that would otherwise totally disrupt the delivery of healthcare services. Properly planning for such an event can build confidence in the organization and safeguard the assets of the institution. In this article, the authors present a step-by-step plan for creating a business continuity plan.
Large and increasing proportions of women work late into pregnancy and resume work soon after delivery. If work in those periods injures their health or that of their infants, this trend would be of public health concern. Data on ever-married primaparas from the National Survey of Family Growth conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics were used to investigate the relationship between working in the last trimester of pregnancy and two indicators of illness--hospitalization of women for complications of pregnancy and hospitalization of their infants during the first year of life. Hospitalization of the mother or child occurred for 15.0 percent of the primaparas. For primaparas who worked in the last trimester of pregnancy, the percentage was slightly higher--17.1 percent. In two groups, black women and women without hospital insurance for delivery, the percentage of mothers or infants hospitalized was much higher among the mothers who worked in the third trimester than among those who did not. The association of working late in pregnancy with higher rates of hospitalization does not mean, necessarily, that working is a cause of hospitalization. It does indicate, however, the need for epidemiologic and medical research on the relationship.
Smaller hospitals have trouble getting their bond issues insured, even if their credit rating is investment grade. Bond insurance companies typically adhere to policies that prohibit insuring hospitals of fewer than 150 to 200 beds.
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The article describes the impact of China's health sector reform on relatively small hospitals in rural counties. It uses one county hospital to illustrate how pressures to increase revenue, combined with distortionary pricing policies, have led to cost increases. It argues that the introduction of hospital insurance could accelerate the cost increases unless measures are taken to control costs. These measures will include improvements to hospital management and changes to mechanisms of payment for hospital services. Government will have to play an active role to ensure that county hospitals serve the needs of rural people.
Data from Saskatchewan's public medical and hospital insurance programs are used to estimate a multivariate model of health services utilization among cholecystectomy patients. A methodology is developed which partitions the care process into an assessment period, a waiting period, and a hospitalization period. The general hypothesis is that presurgical and surgical decisions of physicians are influenced by extra-medical factors, including the social condition of the patient and the availability of health resources. This hypothesis is only weakly supported by the data.
In 1986, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Ball Memorial Hospital v. Mutual Hospital Insurance denied an injunction sought under the antitrust laws by the plaintiffs, eighty acute care hospitals, which would have precluded Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Indiana from implementing a Preferred Provider Organization. The Ball court used a conservative economic analysis to deny the injunction and failed to consider many industry-specific factors. This Note examines these factors and challenges the Ball court's position by arguing that antitrust scrutiny of alternative health care delivery markets must go beyond the court's narrow approach.
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In this article, we present data on aged and disabled Medicare hospital insurance enrollees discharged with the principal diagnosis of cataract from short-stay hospitals. Medical technology has reduced the risk of cataract surgery and the time needed to perform the surgery. As a result, the number of enrollees undergoing cataract surgery has increased. Also, such surgery has been shifted from inpatient hospitals to outpatient facilities. However, outpatient reimbursement for cataract surgery often equals or exceeds inpatient payments. To address this inequity, Congress legislated payment limits for cataract surgery.
Based on a sociological analysis of the populations which were hospitalized in the German academic hospitals during the first half of the 19th century, the purpose of this article is to put into perspective the equivalence which has often been established between penury and hospitalization. Indeed during this period the use of hospitals had not yet spread to all social classes; but numerous signs (such as the rate of activity, the age or the sex of the patients, their geographical origin, the duration of their stay and above all the development of the hospital insurances) shows that the German hospital was in no way only the refuge of indigent and marginal people but an answer to a demand springing from the popular classes as a whole.
Private health insurance (PHI) is an important part of the Australian health system. During the introduction of the recent PHI reforms it was argued that, without the reforms, the public hospital system would undoubtedly collapse under the increased demand for public health services. The increase in PHI coverage might also have been expected to result in an increase in the revenue earned by public hospitals as a result of treating privately insured patients. However, the decline in numbers of privately insured patients using their PHI in public hospitals has continued, with adverse impacts on public hospital budgets in some states. This article addresses the complex interactions between various policy instruments and their impact on public hospitals, and reports the results of a study conducted at the Austin & Repatriation Medical Centre (A&RMC) which examined the reasons for privately insured patients electing not to use their insurance in public hospitals, and methods by which they might be overcome.
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This study examines the effects both of introducing and of removing copayment charges under a universal public medical care and hospital insurance program. For a period between 1968 and 1971, the Province of Saskatchewan imposed user charges of approximately 33 per cent and 6 per cent on medical and hospital services, respectively. The effects of these charges are analyzed using pooled cross-section samples of families and using both multivariate methods and experimental/control groups designs. Diagnostic- and procedure-specific analysis is also performed on the hospital data using the individual as the unit of observation. The findings of the study indicate a copayment effect of 5.6 per cent for physicians' services. No evidence could be adduced that would support the conclusion of a copayment effect for hospital services.
This study assessed the relationship of race and patterns of care, defined by an expert NCI-appointed committee, for 7,781 patients with breast cancer treated in 107 hospitals in 45 communities between 1982 and 1985. After control for age and stage of disease, black patients had significantly different care from white patients for four of the ten patterns examined. They were less likely to have a progesterone receptor assay or to be referred for postmastectomy rehabilitation, two patterns deemed desirable for all patients. Black patients were also more likely to receive liver scans and radiation therapy in situations in which these procedures were labeled "less appropriate (as defined in the text)." Black patients differed significantly from whites on their health insurance, hospital, and physician characteristics; these factors were also significantly associated with the patterns of care. However, after controlling for these variables, the association between race and care persisted for three patterns. The patterns that showed racial differences were not the most clinically significant of the ten studied. Different treatment for black and white patients may help to explain differences in survival rates of black and white women with breast cancer.