Technology in hospitals
1979
Russell, Louise B.
Abstract: New technologies do contribute to rising hospital costs. However, the primary component of rising expenditures is to result of increased insurance benefits and third party payers. Case studies and statistical methods are combined to present new technologies of the past 25 years in the content of the flow of resources into medical care. Technologies considered include intensive care, respiratory therapy, diagnostic radioisotopes, the electroencephalograph, open-heart surgery, cobalt therapy, and renal dialysis. Dilemmas posed by new medical technologies in the United States, Sweden, Great Britain, and France are examined. The best answer to slowing rising costs will be a mixture of policies on ratioing resources. The two possibilities for constraint are: 1) and aggregate limit on total resources, as through a national budget for medical care; and 2) coinsurance for medical care in which the patient pays some fraction of the cost, usually depending on income.
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