The determinants of the use of assistants at surgery
By: Sally Trude ; prepared for the Health Care Financing Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Contributors: United States. Health Care Financing Administration; Rand Corporation; Rand/UCLA/Harvard Center for Health Care Financing Policy Research
Series: A Rand note -- N-3064-HCFA.; Rand note -- N-3064-HCFA.
Publisher: Rand
Published: 1990
Place of publication: Santa Monica, CA
Language: eng
Number of pages: 73
ISBN-13: 9780833017093
Subjects: Operative Surgical Procedures; Economics; Utilization; General Surgery; Manpower; Medicare; Surgery; Economic aspects; Long-term care of the sick; Cost of Medical care
Description: This Note examines the factors that influence the use of physicians as assistants at surgery. Its goal is to describe general patterns of use, as well as to identify potentially inappropriate uses. The author found that most of the assistant-at-surgery dollars are spent on only a small number of procedures. The author therefore found no other procedures for which requiring prior approval could provide savings comparable to those for cataract procedures. Additional analyses show that 86 percent of the uses of physicians as assistants at surgery occur in inpatient hospitals. A striking regional effect emerged from the analysis--physicians in the Mountain and Pacific regions are more than twice as likely to use a physician as an assistant at surgery as are physicians in other parts of the country. This regional effect remains even after controlling for teaching hospitals, urban/rural status, and other characteristics of the physician and the patient.
Notes: "February 1990."

"Rand/UCLA/Harvard Center for Health Care Financing Policy Research."

Includes bibliographical references (p. 73).

Also available freely online.

This research was sponsored by the Health Care Financing Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under Cooperative Agreement no. [99-C-98489/9-06].