<b><i>Background:</i></b> The COVID-19 pandemic has posed greater financial pressure on health systems and institutions that had to respond to the specific needs of COVID-19 patients while ensuring the safety of the diagnosis and treatment of all patients and healthcare professionals. To assess the financial impact of COVID-19 patients admitted to hospitals, we have characterized the cost of COVID-19 admissions, using inpatient data from a Portuguese Tertiary Care University Centre. <b><i>Methods:</i></b> We analysed inpatient data from adult patients diagnosed with COVID-19 who were admitted between March 1, 2020 and May 31, 2020. Admissions were eligible if the ICD-10-CM principal diagnosis was coded U07.1. We excluded admissions from patients under 18 years old, admissions with incomplete records, admissions from patients who had been transferred to or from other hospitals or those whose inpatient stay was under 24 h. Pregnancy, childbirth, and puerperium admissions were also excluded, as well as admissions from patients who had undergone surgery. <b><i>Results:</i></b> We identified 223 admissions of patients diagnosed with COVID-19. Most were men (64.1%) and aged 45–64 years (30.5%). Around 13.0% of patients were admitted to intensive care units and 9.9% died in hospital. The average length of hospital stay was 12.7 days (SD = 10.2) and the average estimated cost per admission was EUR 8,177 (SD = 11,534), which represents more than triple the inpatient base price (EUR 2,386). Human resources accounted for the highest proportion of the total costs per admission (50.8%). About 92.4% of the admissions were assigned to Diagnosis Related Group (DRG) 723, whose inpatient price is lower than COVID-19 inpatient costs for all degrees of severity. <b><i>Conclusion:</i></b> COVID-19 admissions represent a substantial financial burden for the Portuguese NHS. For each COVID-19 hospitalized patient it would have been possible to treat three other hospitalized patients. Also, the price set for DRG 723 is not adjusted to the cost of COVID-19 patients. These findings highlight the need for additional financial resources for the health system and, in particular, for hospitals that have treated high volumes of hospitalized patients diagnosed with COVID-19.
Introduction: One of the most recent important policy reforms in the Portuguese healthcare sector was the creation of seven new vertically integrated organizations, known as Local Health Units (LHU). These organizations are responsible for primary and secondary levels of care, providing comprehensive healthcare services on a population based approach. Currently LHUs cover approximately 12% of the total population and have a global yearly budget of 650 million euros. Theory/ Methods: Despite the lack of evidence about the empirical benefits of integrated care, it is recognized that more integrated organizations achieve improvements on healthcare outcomes. The perceived advantages of creating vertically integrated organizations are: a)the capacity to integrate the decision making process throughout the continuum of care; b)the possibility to encourage health promotion; c) the elimination of redundancies between levels of care, and d) the reduction of more costly interventions. The study focuses on inpatient use due to their high relevance and cost. Therefore, the main objective is to evaluate the impact of creating vertical integrated health care units on inpatient use in Portugal. We selected three inpatient hospital indicators: volume of cases, case-mix index (CMI) and length of stay (LOS). The data source was the national hospital discharge database from 2002 to 2013 (n=15.653.463).
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.