THE ANSWERS OF
MANAGEMENT CONTROL TO THE NEW NEEDS OF
THE PUBLIC HOSPITALS
IN FRANCE
Graduate
Management National
Health Insurance Headquarters
The general
evolution of our society takes many different forms. It very often forces
people and institutions to adapt or even to transform themselves deeply. Public
hospitals are no exception.
In this
context, one observes growing difficulties in reconciling four major
constraints:
- To make
the most of budgets which grow less rapidly than the needs they are supposed to
meet;
- To
provide quality healthcare, in response to the demand expressed by patients;
- To
support the quest for medical excellence, that is for progress;
- To
integrate each hospital's action in the framework of local and national
policies.
Today,
management control offers a constantly improving degree of experience as
concerns tools and methodologies, in order to meet needs both in the short and
medium term.
One of the
main assets of management control is that its participative approach calls on
all the different functions of a hospital, during both the preparatory and
measurement stages of tool preparation, and the follow-up ones
Today, management control must help integrate in the general management of
hospitals both ambulatory cares as the necessary follow-up of some treatments,
and the networked provision of hospital care at different (local, regional and
national) levels.
Management
control lies at the heart of data collection and processing. Its implementation
in hospitals makes it a growingly valuable decision-making tool. Over time, its
missions have changed along with the need for relevant information and the
tools, which are available to process it. Two main trends can be noticed as
concerns the need for information:
- The
growing association of both qualitative and quantitative indicators in order to
aid in the restructuration of activities in the medium and long term.
- Two major
groups of tools are becoming indispensable to aid in the decision-making
process:
* Cost Accounting, in order to
collect financial and activity data;
* Statistical and econometric tools,
including surveys and polls.
The two
groups of tools essentially aim at improving our understanding of real costs
compared to the budgets, activities and projects of hospitals, in order to meet
the requirements of patients and staff alike.
This presentation
aims introducing new- or development-stage techniques, which correspond to the
new requirements of healthcare management. The techniques will be presented
along with a practical way to implement them.
Addresses: René Kieffer: at ESCP – kieffer@escp.fr
Yvon
Merlière: at CNAM – yvon.merliere@cnamts.fr