Chapter 2

CEIS Health Report 2006
The database constructed includes organizations in all 20 Regions 6 , with a total of 77.189
bed places in 2003, with a decrease of 2,73% from the total for the same organizations
in 2002. The number of hospitalizations rose from 3.842.614 in 2002 to 3.781.711 in
2003, while the number of bed-nights fell from 22.865.072 to 21.713.149, a reduction of
5,3%.
Overall, the organizations covered employed 212.167 personnel in 2003, of whom 37.516
doctors and 88.189 nurses.
Their total cost in 2003 amounted to € 14.270 billion, equivalent to € 186.465 per bed
and € 3.741 per hospitalization.
Indicators of activity (bed-fill ratio, mean weight of the DRG, attraction index etc.), of cost
(per day stay in hospital, per hospitalization and mean cost of the personnel) and of the
efficiency of the factors of production (e.g. discharges per doctor, nurses per bed place)
were calculated for each hospital organization.
Focusing on the indicators of cost, we find that between 2002 and 2003 the mean cost
per day of stay rose by 4,5% whereas the cost per unit of personnel remained almost the
same (+ 0,04%).
Obviously, the indicators in question are affected by the different complexities treated
and are not yet suitable for comparisons between organizations.
3.2.3 Cost per unit of homogeneous hospitalization in Italian public sector
health organizations
The cost per unit of homogeneous hospitalization, or cost per DRG point 7 , for the 89
hospital organizations examined averaged € 3.555,83 in 2002 and € 3.627,76 in 2003,
with maxima of € 6.779,86 and € 7.351,66 and minima of € 1.867,64 and € 2.080,22
respectively.
One notes immediately that, contrary to expectations, the (comparable) cost per case
Table 1 – Principal indicators of cost: hospital
organizations
Cost per DRG point 2002 2003
Usable observations 89 89
National mean 3.555,83 3.627,76
Median 3.480,80 3.518,13
Standard deviation 843,97 879,23
Max 6.779,86 7.351,66
Min 2.080,22 1.867,64
Max/min 3,26 3,94
6 As is well known, some Regions have made all hospital organizations independent, while others have not “released” any.
7 See Fioravanti, Polistena, Spandonaro 2005 for the technical details.
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