This report presents statistics on the utilization of non-Federal short-stay hospitals by diagnosis-related groups (DRG’s) based on data collected through the National Hospital Discharge Survey. Estimates are provided for patients under 65 years of age and for patients 65 years of age and older on the frequency and average length of stay for each DRG from 1980 through 1984. These statistics are...

The use of Diagnosis Related Groups (DRGs) may not be an accurate tool to provide reimbursement for trauma services. This study aimed to determine whether Australian Refined Diagnosis Related Groups (AR-DRGs) adequately describe the trauma patient episode and to identify AR-DRG groupings where reimbursement was not commensurate with actual cost. The AR-DRG allocated costs and actual costs of a ...

The Australian DRG variant (Australian National DRGs from versions 1 to 3, and Australian Refined DRGs thereafter) compares favourably with other variants in use around the world. This view is supported by a variety of empirical studies (see for example Reid, Palmer & Aisbett 2000) and by experiences of its adoption by several health care systems. An example is its recent selection for use in G...

Slovenia is embarking on an ambitious health sector reform program, a small part of which involves implementing the categorization of acute inpatients by DRG for payment purposes. I summarise the leading DRG variants, and describe the process of selecting one of them. I argue that the Slovenian decision to use the Australian DRG variant as a starting point was sensible in terms of cost, speed o...

There were and largely continue to be no descriptions of hospital outputs other than the number of inpatients and their average length of stay. Before 1995, the product of both figures determined the daily fee of a hospital. For example, a hospital with 20,000 inpatients having an average LOS of 7 days would be funded for 140,000 patient days. Assuming a total budget of DM70 million, the daily ...

One matter on which we were agreed is that, with respect to areas of potential improvement in Australian DRGs, Hindle (2001) agrees with us! Most of the ideas that he presents have been the subject of informal discussions among interested parties across the Tasman. Hindle does not claim otherwise, but adds to our understanding by presenting the ideas in a clear and relatively comprehensive way....

Introduction Within many diagnosis related group (DRG) systems, there is recognition that a single cost weight per DRG is not suitable, and that cost weights should take into account extremely lengthy hospital stays. Long lengths of stay are considered to be due to factors largely beyond the control of the hospital, and a single weight per DRG would potentially place hospitals under financial r...