Abstract
In the paper the costs of Polish county hospitals in 2015–2018 are studied using behavioral cost function. The set of variables combines hospitals’ characteristics which may determine their level of costs, such as the form of ownership, bed turnover rate, number of patient-days and share of beds in emergency department with environment characteristics which may influence both outsourcing costs and patients’ health. In 2017 the system of basic hospital service provision (hospital network) was introduced in Poland. Dummy variables included in the model represent the category of hospital in the system. The results show that the costs may be described using fixed effect panel model. Positive impact of percentage of emergency department patients transferred to other departments and of wages is found. Higher ratio of residents and interns to doctors is found to decrease costs. Dummy variable for the period after the introduction of hospital network assumed a negative sign with costs, but the parameter remained insignificant.
Highlights
Specifics of the hospitals services does not release the managers from pursuing efficiency and avoiding wasting resources. [1] emphasizes the role of costs in the decision-making which takes place within management of hospitals, presenting results of the questionnaire related to the approaches to costs calculations and usage of costs-related information by managers
Dataset used in the current paper does not include many of categories suggested by Kurup in the ideal approach [7], because it has been created for different reasons
VIFs (Variance inflation factors) calculated for the random effects (RE) and pooled model (of an identical structure as RE, given by formula (4)) in which dummies for category 1 instead of “other” are present, lead to the conclusion that multicollinearity was present
Summary
Specifics of the hospitals services does not release the managers from pursuing efficiency and avoiding wasting resources. [1] emphasizes the role of costs in the decision-making which takes place within management of hospitals, presenting results of the questionnaire related to the approaches to costs calculations and usage of costs-related information by managers. [1] emphasizes the role of costs in the decision-making which takes place within management of hospitals, presenting results of the questionnaire related to the approaches to costs calculations and usage of costs-related information by managers. Such information is useful mainly in budgeting and planning, costs control and profitability analysis. In Poland the problem of cost containment in healthcare sector seems especially important due to the combination of unfavourable factors, i.a.: system focused around hospitals, overcapacity, low outpatient care [3], relatively low spending on healthcare, changes in the legal environment, lack of personnel and increasing debts[4].
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