title: The strategy of casemix.
abstract: While the political debate rages over whether casemix brings economic benefits for Australian health care, managers are observing a pragmatic change to their business and some are using casemix to understand and manage their business better. Casemix is a useful tool in this environment of increasing management accountability and process re-engineering. This article reviews casemix from a process innovation perspective; comments on its real use for strategic health care management; and suggests a simple matrix used by St John of God hospitals throughout Australia to implement and measure progress towards quality casemix-managed hospitals. The management motivation for this matrix was to promote hospital resourcing decisions supplemented by casemix information.
authors.affiliation: St John of God Health Care System, Australia.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Dowling
mesh_terms: D001315:Australia; D003953:Diagnosis-Related Groups / Q000191:economics / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006302:Health Services Research; D006788:Hospitals, Voluntary / Q000191:economics / Q000458:organization & administration*; D008330:Management Audit; D017146:Models, Organizational; D009096:Multi-Institutional Systems / Q000191:economics / Q000458:organization & administration*; D009936:Organizational Innovation; D010934:Planning Techniques; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care