Samer Sliteen, Halim Boussabaine and Orlando Catarina
The purpose of this paper is to present a benchmarking study of operation and maintenance costs of French healthcare facilities between 2008 and 2009. The investigation presents…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to present a benchmarking study of operation and maintenance costs of French healthcare facilities between 2008 and 2009. The investigation presents findings using quantitative methods, including cumulative frequency and descriptive statistics. The purpose also is to highlight and capture the performance profile of long‐term hospitals, using several operational cost drivers.
Design/methodology/approach
A literature review revealed that there are no studies on the benchmarking of operation or maintenance costs of health facilities in France. Operational cost drivers reported in literature from other countries were used as the underlying constructs for this research, with a view to generating a benchmarking framework for the health assets in the data sample. The data were extracted from the databases of the hospitals concerned. Some of the data were collected via interviews and questionnaires. Statistical analysis was carried out to investigate and generate potential benchmarking cost curves. Potential operational cost drivers were extracted and used to develop cumulative frequency curves for benchmarking purposes.
Findings
The authors found that cost per bed ratio can be used as an efficient metric to classify health facilities into similar to data sets. The results also show that the operational costs of utilities, maintenance and operations & maintenance staff correlate positively and significantly with the square meter of floor area. This relationship indicates that 82 per cent of the operational performance can be explained by this linear relationship. However, it was found that the relationship between the total of operational costs per square meter with the floor is negatively correlated and surprisingly only explains 41 per cent of the performance of the health asset operational cost variation in the data sample.
Originality/value
The paper presents the first metric benchmarking method in France which allows health facility managers in France to evaluate and develop operational strategies, with a view to reducing the costs burden.
Details
Keywords
Halim Boussabaine, Samer Sliteen and Orlando Catarina
This paper aims to examine for the first time the impact of the intensity of hospital bed occupancy on healthcare facilities operational costs in France.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine for the first time the impact of the intensity of hospital bed occupancy on healthcare facilities operational costs in France.
Design/methodology/approach
Research methodology is based on empirical data collection from 19 short‐stay care acute and long‐term care hospital facilities in Paris, France, carried out during 2008. Statistic analysis was conducted to investigate the impact of bed occupancy on operational cost of health facilities. The purpose of the analysis is to determine the best practices and provide recommendations to the decision makers for operational cost budgeting purposes.
Findings
The main findings are the relationship between bed usage and operational costs of acute hospital facilities in France. An analysis of annual O&M (operation and maintenance) cost clearly indicated that type of medical activities had a major impact on O&M cost when the influence of all other potential factors, particularly, morphology, quality of construction and age, were excluded.
Research limitations/implications
Data sample is limited to hospitals in the Paris region. Hence, extrapolation from the generated results to other regions in France is limited. Other facilities operational cost drivers, such as conditional surveys of buildings, need to be considered alongside the performance measures included in this study.
Practical implications
The results will help in establishing best practices and benchmarking operational costs in heath care facilities in France. They will also assist in developing and planning strategic heath care operational budgets. One of the most important implications of the results is in assisting decision makers to develop facilities management improvement strategies.
Originality/value
The research described in this paper represents significantly advances in the understanding of the impact of medical activities on operation and maintenance costs of healthcare facilities in France.