Assigning a code from any of the diagnosis-related groups to a short-stay hospital discharge covered by Medicare is tantamount to the Medicare payment to the hospital, subject to certain statutory adjustments. Therefore, diagnosis-related groups are the backbone of the prospective payment system implemented October 1, 1983. However, methods employed in the assignment of diagnosis-related groups...

THERE SHOULD be more practising clinicians working for nursing's statutory bodies and fewer educationalists, the review argues.

A diverse group of stakeholders has suggested that U.S. federal environmental programs should be integrated more tightly with local land use planning entities to improve environmental decision making and enhance public involvement. Proponents of this argument have been particularly vocal in the western part of the country. This article uses the example of a Superfund site in California to exami...

The title actually assigned to me for discussion on this occasion had a slightly more academic ring than the one I have chosen. I see no reason why, even before this group, a “spade” need be defined as “an elongated instrument by which perspiration and energy are applied to the movement of loose material from one place to another”; let’s just call it a “spade.” Let’s recognize that the Public U...

Karen Quinlan, the American girl who has lain in deep coma for many months, is still 'alive', that is to say, her heart is still beating and brain death has not occurred. However, several other cases have raised difficult issues about the time of death. Dr Skegg argues that there is a case for a legal definition of death enshrined in statutory form. He suggests that many of the objections to a ...