Methods of Determining the Cost of Health Care in the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Centers and Other Nonpriced Settings
- 1 September 1991
- journal article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Evaluation & the Health Professions
- Vol. 14 (3), 282-303
- https://doi.org/10.1177/016327879101400303
Abstract
Cost is increasingly important in the evaluation of health care. Though charges are often used as a proxy for cos4 some health care systems such as the Veterans Administration do little or no billing. This article describes, presents examples of and evaluates four options for determining the cost of care within the Department of Veterans Affairs: measuring input costs, the Departmen t's cost accounting system, the reimbursement system, and use of charges from a surrogate health care facility. Each approach is evaluated for accuracy, ability to compare the costs of different treatments, and effort required to estimate cost.Keywords
This publication has 13 references indexed in Scilit:
- The Association of Patients' Socioeconomic Characteristics with the Length of Hospital Stay and Hospital Charges within Diagnosis-Related GroupsNew England Journal of Medicine, 1988
- Rapid Estimation of Hospitalization Charges From a Brief Medical Record ReviewMedical Care, 1986
- Optimization of a toxicology programClinical Biochemistry, 1986
- Severity of illness within DRGs: impact on prospective payment.American Journal of Public Health, 1985
- Nursing Home Care as an Alternative to Psychiatric HospitalizationArchives of General Psychiatry, 1985
- Classification of Ambulatory Care Using Patient-based, Time-oriented IndexesMedical Care, 1985
- Resource Utilization GroupsMedical Care, 1985
- Effectiveness of a Geriatric Evaluation UnitNew England Journal of Medicine, 1984
- The Distinction Between Cost and ChargesAnnals of Internal Medicine, 1982
- Estimating hospital costs by diagnosis for population-based analysisJournal of Community Health, 1981