Evening star., 1947-10-27
ExtensiiveStudy
0fHospitaIFees
Proposed Here
Survey Would Cover
Effect Of Expenses on
Family Budgets
By Thomas 6. Buehonon

The most exhaustive study ever
made of what patient pays when
he goes to hospital is under con-
for the District.
How much goes for doctors feesf
How much for special nurses. for
food, for drugs, for use OF the oper-
ating room. anesthetics and other
items of the hospital bill? And
above all, in what condition does
this leave the family budget?
The Committee on Medical Care
of the District Medical Society will
consider proposal Wednesday to
ask the United States Public Health
Service for aid in carrying out a
survey of these hospital expenses
in the whole Metropolitan Area.
If approved by the committee and
by the society's Executive Board.
the project will be referred to the
Federal health agency. There, off,
clals are understood to be ready to
go ahead with the study They say
It would be the most detailed ever
attempted for an area of this size.
Freedmen's Controversy Cited.
Medical Society. leaders feel peo-
pie are entitled to know just what
they are paying for when illness
strikes their family.
There is, at present, no source In
the District which can provide exact
information on this question. The
hospitals themselves have difficulty
in determining what part of their
total operating costs to apportion
to each department.
How important this can be was
shown in the recent controversy
over rates to be charged the District
for charity cases at Freedmans
Hospital The hospitals own cal
culations assigned only II per cent
of total cost to the tuberculosis
ward, while Budget Bureau experts
raised the figure to Is per cent, with
a corresponding revision of rates
affecting both general and tuber-
culosis patients.
Private Room Costs S12:
The average citizen, medical So
ciety spokesmen feel, can afford to
pay normal fees for visits to his
doctors Office and only when illness
becomes acute and admission to a
hospital is necessary does the burden
become severe.
He may be so sick that a private
room is needed, they point out.
That will cost him about IL a day
in the average hospital. But when
he is released from the hospital,
he'll find many other items listed,
sending the total we'll into three
figures.
The proposed survey would not
only break down the hospital bill
into its component parts: but would
compare it with the annual income
Fof the patients family.
Hospital administrators have
pointed out that the amount Of
service given any hospital would be
impossible to reproduce at a first
class hotel for the same price.
May Offer Prepaid Plan.
But the city's chief medical organ
ization wants to know just what
financial problems their patientS
face, so that something may be
done to relieve that burden.
The solution the District Medical
Society is prepared to offer soon is
"a prepaid surgical coverage, COM
bined with Group Hospitalization's
room rate coverage Eventually, the
medical organization hopes to be
able to give the public an oppor-
tunity to buy comprehensive med
ical protection, which would include
all items of the hospital bill.
! If approved. the survey of overall
hospital costs would leave the Dis
trict one of the most carefully
charted areas in the country on
health facilities. The Public Health
Service has just completed a study
of District doctors and their special
ties, requested by the District Med
ical Society 1t has also made a
cancer survey and is about to UNDER
take an analysis of the commune
itV'S tuberculosis rate