Dr. Rasha Salama PhD Community Medicine and Public Health Suez Canal University Egypt

Utilization is defined as the manner in which a certain community makes use of its available hospital resources.

Utilization of a certain hospital can be measured by:  Volume of Hospital Utilization.  Character of Individuals Utilizing Hospital.  Efficiency of Hospital Utilization

This is calculated according to:  Number of discharges (patients) of a hospital.  Days of hospital care (service days). = sum of all patients days in hospital.  Average length of stay (ALS). The mean.

 Character Utilization:  Use according to age  Use according to sex  Use according to procedure i.e. biopsy, surgery…  Use according to diagnosis (through international classification of disease).

Efficiency of hospital utilization:  An efficient hospital is one that is capable of achieving these results with no or minimal waste (cost/effectiveness).

Effectiveness of hospital utilization:  An effective hospital is one that is capable of producing good results in terms of prevention and cure of diseases and disabilities.

 These are measured through:  Beds costs and their number:  Bed occupancy rate.  Negative side – vacancy rate (no. of empty beds)  Turn-over rate

Number of patients' day (service days) in a year Number of beds x 365 X 100

Number of patients' day (service days) in a year Number of beds x 30 X 100

 Vacancy Rate = 100% - occupancy rate

The number of patients in a specific period The number of beds