Where the question “How are we doing?” gets answered.

One of the measures of our commitment to bring down the cost of world-class health care is the University HealthSystem Consortium (UHC) Clinical Data Base. This independently estimated cost of patient care compares a ratio of cost to charges for various hospital services.

The lower the number, the better.

We’re proud to say we’re on the right track, but not too proud to say there’s more work to be done.

Our Measured Service Lines

The chart below represents the major service areas available at all of our hospitals.

Mean Observed/Mean Expected Cost for Major Service Lines

(Average = 1.0%)

Definitions of Each Service Line

Cardiology — Medical disorders of the heart
Gastroenterology — Medical disorders of liver and gastrointestinal tract
Gynecology — Medical disorders and surgical procedures of female reproductive system
Medicine general — General medical disorders, including infections and organ failure (except for cardiology and gastroenterology)
Neurology — Disorders of the neurologic system, such as stroke, headache, seizures, multiple sclerosis, etc.
Orthopedics — Surgery of bones and joints
Surgery general — General surgery — abdominal, biliary, endocrine, vascular and breast (does not include cardiac)
Urology — Surgery of kidney, bladder and male reproductive system

UHC Methodology

In the UHC Clinical Data Base, UHC provides an estimated cost of patient care using a ratio of cost to charges (RCC) methodology. UHC uses the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) cost reports to obtain service line costs and revenues. Specific costs and revenues from the report are used to calculate an RCC for each service. UHC collects detailed patient charges at the revenue code level. Estimated service center costs are derived from multiplying charges by the RCC. Total costs are computed by summing individual cost center estimates.

Individual hospitals' RCCs are subjected to quality checks. RCCs may be trimmed, imputed, and in cases of poor data quality, set to null values.

Independent research has quantified the accuracy of the RCC method in comparison with other costing methods. Nonetheless, certain cautions are given about interpreting the cost estimates.