Hospital Length-of-Stay Forecasting

An Often Inaccurate Medical Effectiveness Meter

Staff Reporters

According to Gregory O. Ginn; PhD, CPA, MBA, MS, and Assistant Professor in the Department of Healthcare Policy and Administration from UNLV, substantial day-to-day variation in hospital occupancy may lead to increases in costs.

Forecast Accuracy

Accordingly, hospitals may be able to improve their financial efficiency by preparing more accurate forecasts of stay length, and thus of their utilization of capacity. For instance, the accuracy of predicted length of stay can be improved by using multiple-regression. The patient’s characteristics (age, gender, ethnicity, marital status, admission type, and admission source) and clinical indicators for their diagnosis-related groups [DRGs] are significant predictors of length-of- stay [LOS].

Assessment

The effectiveness of medical interventions is often measured by length-of-stay. However, this is a crude measure that is contaminated by the inclusion of all days in the hospital even if they were not preceded by some type of intervention.

More info: www.HealthcareFinancials.com

Conclusion

Other experts suggest an approach that views only the slice of time after a medical intervention to measure the effect of the intervention on LOS. This may be a more precise method that can improve the accuracy of forecasting. What do you think?

As always, your thoughts and comments on this Executive-Post are appreciated.

Related Information Sources:

Practice Management: http://www.springerpub.com/prod.aspx?prod_id=23759

Physician Financial Planning: http://www.jbpub.com/catalog/0763745790

Medical Risk Management: http://www.jbpub.com/catalog/9780763733421

Healthcare Organizations: www.HealthcareFinancials.com

Health Administration Terms: www.HealthDictionarySeries.com

Physician Advisors: www.CertifiedMedicalPlanner.com

Speaker: If you need a moderator or speaker for an upcoming event, Dr. David E. Marcinko; MBA – Publisher-in-Chief of the Executive-Post – is available for seminar or speaking

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