The costs of visits to emergency departments

Article Abstract:

The marginal cost of treating non-urgent cases in the emergency department may be fairly low, contrary to popular belief. The marginal cost of a consultation is the extra cost of attending to an additional patient in a fully staffed and equipped medical facility. Researchers analyzed the cost of 24,010 emergency consultations during a 12-week period in 1993. About one third of all cases were not urgent, 26% were semiurgent, and 42% were urgent. The average total charge for emergency care, hospital, and physician fees was $383 per visit and the marginal cost was $88 per visit. Nonurgent charges were less than $125, at a marginal cost of less than $25. Most of these visits involved hand or finger injury, eye infections, toothaches and other symptoms. Shifting nonurgent care to private practitioners may thus not translate into presumably huge savings.

Finance, Hospitals, Emergency medical services, Medical care utilization

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The health care costs of smoking

Article Abstract:

A large increase in the number of people who quit smoking may lower health care costs in the short run but would raise them in the long run. This was the conclusion reached by researchers who used life tables to estimate the change in health care costs over time if many smokers quit. Since smokers generally have poorer health, their health care costs are 40% higher than non-smokers' costs. However, if all smokers in a population quit, health care costs would initially drop but then rise to a higher rate than at present. This is because ex-smokers would live longer and would incur greater costs as they aged.

Smoking cessation programs, Smoking cessation

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Should we worry about hospitals' high administrative costs?

Article Abstract:

It is probably not necessary to be concerned about an increase in administrative costs in for-profit hospitals. A 1997 study found that for-profit hospitals spent more on administrative functions than private non-profit and public hospitals. However, market competition has brought inflation of health care costs under control. Issues of concern include whether for-profit hospitals achieved this cost reduction by sacrificing quality of care. It is well-known that for-profit hospitals provide less charity care and fewer services that typically lose money, such as emergency departments.

Editorial, Hospitals, Proprietary, Proprietary hospitals

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