What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
Intervenors who participated as parties at the courts of appeals should be counted as either appellants or respondents when it can be determined whose position they supported. For example, if there were two plaintiffs who lost in district court, appealed, and were joined by four intervenors who also asked the court of appeals to reverse the district court, the number of appellants should be coded as six.
In some cases there is some confusion over who should be listed as the appellant and who as the respondent. This confusion is primarily the result of the presence of multiple docket numbers consolidated into a single appeal that is disposed of by a single opinion. Most frequently, this occurs when there are cross appeals and/or when one litigant sued (or was sued by) multiple litigants that were originally filed in district court as separate actions. The coding rule followed in such cases should be to go strictly by the designation provided in the title of the case. The first person listed in the title as the appellant should be coded as the appellant even if they subsequently appeared in a second docket number as the respondent and regardless of who was characterized as the appellant in the opinion.
To clarify the coding conventions, consider the following hypothetical case in which the US Justice Department sues a labor union to strike down a racially discriminatory seniority system and the corporation (siding with the position of its union) simultaneously sues the government to get an injunction to block enforcement of the relevant civil rights law. From a district court decision that consolidated the two suits and declared the seniority system illegal but refused to impose financial penalties on the union, the corporation appeals and the government and union file cross appeals from the decision in the suit brought by the government. Assume the case was listed in the Federal Reporter as follows:
United States of America,
Plaintiff, Appellant
v
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendant, Appellee.
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendants, Cross-appellants
v
United States of America.
Widgets, Inc. & Susan Kuersten Sheehan, President & Chairman
of the Board
Plaintiff, Appellants,
v
United States of America,
Defendant, Appellee.
This case should be coded as follows:Appellant = United States, Respondents = International Brotherhood of Widget Workers Widgets, Inc., Total number of appellants = 1, Number of appellants that fall into the category "the federal government, its agencies, and officials" = 1, Total number of respondents = 3, Number of respondents that fall into the category "private business and its executives" = 2, Number of respondents that fall into the category "groups and associations" = 1.
Note that if an individual is listed by name, but their appearance in the case is as a government official, then they should be counted as a government rather than as a private person. For example, in the case "Billy Jones & Alfredo Ruiz v Joe Smith" where Smith is a state prisoner who brought a civil rights suit against two of the wardens in the prison (Jones & Ruiz), the following values should be coded: number of appellants that fall into the category "natural persons" =0 and number that fall into the category "state governments, their agencies, and officials" =2. A similar logic should be applied to businesses and associations. Officers of a company or association whose role in the case is as a representative of their company or association should be coded as being a business or association rather than as a natural person. However, employees of a business or a government who are suing their employer should be coded as natural persons. Likewise, employees who are charged with criminal conduct for action that was contrary to the company policies should be considered natural persons.
If the title of a case listed a corporation by name and then listed the names of two individuals that the opinion indicated were top officers of the same corporation as the appellants, then the number of appellants should be coded as three and all three were coded as a business (with the identical detailed code). Similar logic should be applied when government officials or officers of an association were listed by name.
Your specific task is to determine the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "private business and its executives". If the total number cannot be determined (e.g., if the appellant is listed as "Smith, et. al." and the opinion does not specify who is included in the "et.al."), then answer 99.

Opinion:
The ARLINGTON HOSPITAL, Appellant, v. Margaret M. HECKLER, Secretary, Department of Health & Human Services, Appellee. The ARLINGTON HOSPITAL, Appellee, v. Margaret M. HECKLER, Secretary, Department of Health & Human Services, Appellant. The ARLINGTON HOSPITAL, Appellee, v. Margaret M. HECKLER, Secretary, Department of Health & Human Services, Appellant. The ARLINGTON HOSPITAL, Appellant, v. Margaret M. HECKLER, Secretary, Department of Health & Human Services, Appellee.
Nos. 82-1946, 82-2047, 83-1439 and 83-1446.
United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.
Argued Jan. 10, 1984.
Decided March 26, 1984.
Leonard C. Homer, Baltimore, Md. (Sanford V. Teplitzky, Warren B. Daly, Jr., Ober, Grimes & Shriver, Baltimore, Md., on brief), for appellant.
Amy Yourman, Dept, of Health and Human Services, New York City (Elsie L. Munsell, U.S. Atty., Paula P. Newett, Alexandria, Va., Asst. U.S. Atty., Juan A. Del Real, Gen. Counsel, Ann T. Hunsaker, Asst. Gen. Counsel, Dept, of Health and Human Services, Washington, D.C., on brief), for appellee.
Before HALL and ERVIN, Circuit Judges, and BUTZNER, Senior Circuit Judge.
K.K. HALL, Circuit Judge:
The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (“Secretary”) cross-appeals from a portion of an order of the district court, reversing the Secretary’s denial of reimbursement to Arlington Hospital (“Hospital”) for the cost of inpatient telephone services provided to Medicare beneficiaries under Title XVIII of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1395, et seq. We conclude that the Secretary’s regulation, which prohibits reimbursement for the personal use of bedside telephones of Medicare patients, is valid and enforceable. Accordingly, we reverse and remand the matter to the district court to determine the appropriate method of excluding the Hospital’s cost of patient telephones from Medicare reimbursement.
I.
The Hospital is a short-term, general, acute-care facility, located in Arlington, Virginia, and qualified to provide services under the federal Medicare program. During 1977, the Hospital incurred costs of providing telephone services to its Medicare patients. It requested reimbursement for these costs under Medicare from Blue Cross Association and its subcontractor, Group Hospital, Inc., the fiscal intermediary responsible for handling such claims.
When the intermediary refused to include the costs of patient telephones as part of the Hospital’s reimbursable expenses, the Hospital appealed the decision to the Provider Reimbursement Review Board (“PRRB”). The PRRB disallowed the portion of the Hospital’s telephone costs attributable to the patient’s personal use and its decision on this matter was affirmed by the Secretary.
Subsequently, the Hospital filed this action in district court, seeking $19,642 for providing inpatient telephone services to Medicare patients. In granting plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment on this issue, the ■ district court found that it had jurisdiction to review the claim. It then concluded that the Secretary’s treatment of patient telephones as a non-reimbursable personal comfort item conflicted with the Medicare statute, was arbitrary and capricious, and was not supported by substantial evidence. The Arlington Hospital v. Schweiker, 547 F.Supp. 670 (E.D.Va.1982). In reaching its conclusion, the court below adopted the holding of another district court that had considered the same issue, St. James Hospital v. Harris, 535 F.Supp. 751 (N.D.Ill.1981). The Secretary has cross-appealed from this portion of the decision below.
II.
The Secretary contends that the district court lacked jurisdiction to consider the patient telephone issue. The Secretary further argues that, assuming judicial review is appropriate, her regulation prohibiting reimbursement for patient telephone costs is valid.
For the reasons expressed by the district court, Id. at 675-77, we reject the Secretary’s contention that judicial review is barred under 42 U.S.C. § 1395oo(g). We agree, however, with the Secretary that the patient telephone regulation is clearly authorized by the Medicare statute and, as such, is valid and enforceable.
42 U.S.C. § 1395y(a)(6) provides that “no payment may be made under [Medicare] for any expenses incurred for items or services — which constitute personal comfort items____” The Secretary’s regulation, 42 C.F.R. § 405.310(j), lists as examples of personal comfort items “a television set, or telephone service, etc.” (Emphasis added). The Secretary relied on this regulation in denying the Hospital’s claim for reimbursement. The Hospital contends, however, that the Secretary’s regulation conflicts with the Medicare statute’s requirement to pay for “inpatient hospital services” including “equipment, for use in the hospital, as [is] ordinarily furnished by such hospital for the care and treatment of inpatients,” 42 U.S.C. § 1395x(b)(2), and “such other diagnostic or therapeutic items or services ... ordinarily furnished to inpatients____” 42 U.S.C. § 1395x(b)(3).
According to the Hospital, patient telephones come within the statutory definition of covered inpatient hospital services, because the record demonstrates that they are ordinarily furnished to inpatients and, by providing access to friends and relatives, have therapeutic value. Furthermore, the Hospital argues that the legislative history of the Medicare statute demonstrates Congressional intent to exclude from coverage potential personal comfort items, like -telephones, only when they have no therapeutic value. We cannot accept the Hospital’s position on this question.
In our view, the Secretary’s determination to exclude patient telephones as a personal comfort item is consistent with the Medicare statute and is neither arbitrary nor capricious. There are many items which could be of some therapeutic benefit to the patient, but which are not so directly related or essential to the delivery of health care services as to justify reimbursement under Medicare. Certainly, it was not the intent of Congress to reimburse the cost of every item with tangential therapeutic value, merely because a hospital undertakes to furnish that item routinely to its patients. Contrary to the Hospital’s assertion, neither the language of the Medicare statute nor its legislative history suggests such a result.
The Secretary thus acted reasonably and well within the bounds of her discretion in concluding that the costs of telephones for the personal use of patients, like television sets, are, despite their therapeutic value, not reimbursable under Medicare. We agree with other courts that have considered this same issue, and conclude that because the Secretary’s regulation is reasonable, it must be upheld by this Court. Memorial Hospital v. Heckler, 706 F.2d 1130 (11th Cir.1983); St. Mary of Nazareth Hospital Center v. Department of Health and Human Services, 698 F.2d 1337 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, — U.S.-, 104 S.Ct. 107, 78 L.Ed.2d 110 (1983); Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas v. Harris, 638 F.2d 1381 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 940, 102 S.Ct. 476, 70 L.Ed.2d 248 (1981); St. Francis Hospital, Inc. v. Califano, 479 F.Supp. 761 (D.D.C.1979).
Accordingly, we hold that the cost of providing a Medicare patient with a bedside telephone is not reimbursable under the Medicare program. We reverse the contrary holding of the district court and remand this case for a determination of the appropriate accounting method to be employed in excluding the costs of patient telephones from the Hospital’s reimbursable expenses.
III.
For the foregoing reasons, that portion of the district court’s judgment relating to patient telephones is reversed and the matter is remanded for further evidentiary proceedings consistent with this opinion.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
. See The Arlington Hospital v. Schweiker, 547 F.Supp. 670 (E.D.Va.1982). The Hospital appealed from another portion of the district court's order, which held that the costs of uncompensated care, furnished by the Hospital to indigents, pursuant to the Hill-Burton Act, 42 U.S.C. § 291 et seq., were not reimbursable under the Medicare program. At oral argument, counsel for the Hospital conceded that it was bound by this Court's decision in Iredell Memorial Hospital, Inc. v. Schweiker, 699 F.2d 196 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 104 S.Ct. 150, 78 L.Ed.2d 139 (1983), and accordingly withdrew its appeal of the Hill-Burton issue.
A final portion of the district court's order struck down, as arbitrary and capricious, the Secretary’s approval of a methodology employed to calculate the costs of nonreimbursable physician billing services. There was no appeal taken from this aspect of the district court’s decision.
. Because the patient telephone issue is the only issue we are concerned with in this appeal, we will not address the other claims for relief raised and disposed of below. See supra note 1.
. Following the district court’s disposition of the instant case, the Seventh Circuit reversed the decision in St. James Hospital v. Harris, 535 F.Supp. 751 (N.D.Ill.1981), rev'd sub nom. St. Mary of Nazareth Hospital Center v. Department of Health and Human Services, 698 F.2d 1337 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, - U.S. -, 104 S.Ct. 107, 78 L.Ed.2d 110 (1983).
. Other Circuit Courts that have addressed this question have likewise found jurisdiction to review the issue of patient telephone costs. Memorial Hospital v. Heckler, 706 F.2d 1130, 1132— 33 (11th Cir. 1983); St. Mary of Nazareth Hospital Center v. Department of Health and Human Services, 698 F.2d 1337, 1345-46 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, — U.S.-, 104 S.Ct. 107, 78 L.Ed.2d 110 (1983).
. The Secretary acknowledges that reimbursement is available where patient telephones are used in a manner directly related to health care, such as for intra-hospital medical communications or as part of a cardiac arrest system.
. The Secretary argues that average costing is the appropriate method for disallowing the costs at issue. That method allocates to each telephone in the hospital its proportionate share of all hospital costs and then excludes from reimbursement the expenses of all phones assigned to patient use. The Hospital, on the other hand, contends that only the incremental or marginal cost of providing patient telephones should be disallowed. Under the latter method, disallowance would be limited to those costs which would be saved if the bedside telephones were removed. We leave resolution of this issue in the first instance to the district court, which has not yet had an opportunity to consider it.

Question: What is the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "private business and its executives"? Answer with a number.

Choices:

Answer: 1