papers

Measurement of relative cost weights as an effect of the retrospective application of Adjusted Clinical Groups in primary care

Gac Sanit 20:132-141. Published in Spanish.

Badalona Serveis Assistencials, S.A., Badalona, Barcelona, España

OBJECTIVE: The objective of the study is to obtain the cost’s relative average weights of the assistance with the retrospective application of the Adjusted Clinical Groups (ACG’s) in four teams of Primary Care with an attended population in the habitual clinical practice situation.

METHODS: Descriptive study of retrospective character. It was included in the study all attended patients by four teams of Primary Care during year 2003. The main measures were: universal variables (age and gender), dependents (visits and costs) and casuistic and co morbidity. The model of cost per each patient was established differencing the fix costs and the variable ones. Was effected a multiple lineal regression analysis for the prediction of models. The relative cost of each ACG was obtained dividing the average cost of each category among the average cost of each population of reference.

RESULTS: The total number of the studied patients was 62,311 (intensity of use: 76.7%), with an average 4.8 +/- 3.2 episodes and 7.8 +/- 7.5 visits/patient/year. The distribution of costs was 24,135,236.41 euro, 28.9% for fix. The total unitary cost per visit/year was 49.62 +/- 24.71 euro and the average of the total cost per patient/year 387.34 +/- 145.87 euro (relative weights of reference). The explicative power of the classification of ACG was 50.1% in visits and 54.9% for total costs.

CONCLUSIONS: The ACG are an acceptable system of classification of patients in situation of habitual clinic practice. In case results were confirmed will make possible an improvement in the practice application of ACG as a possible tool for the clinical management in Primary Care centers.

PMID: 16753090