The analysis of healthcare costs applying an Activity-based Costing approach

Abstract

We introduce an application of Activity-based Costing (ABC) to specific healthcare procedures. The analyses carried out, using data of the Perugia’s hospital. The main purpose of our study is to analyze the cost incurred between two procedures that have the same DRG (diagnosis-related group), in order to highlight how the costs are different in relation to the different cost procedure., highlight cost between the two procedures. Moreover, we identify also differences in the level of resource absorption in both procedures and, therefore, different cost impacts on the procedures are analyzed. In this respect, the application of the ABC has the undoubted advantage of determining the cost of healthcare service and support more objective decisions to be taken by healthcare management.