ABSTRACT OF SUGGESTED READING:
SR2-8 James T. Schmida, "The Need for Flexible Beds in the 21st Century," Health Care Strategic Management (January, 2000): 16-17.
This is an interesting article taking a futuristic architectural view of hospital beds, such as square footage necessary and design for hospital bed rooms, smart rooms, etc.
U.S. Hospitals will soon face an inpatient bed shortage. Since 1980 there has been a downward trend in inpatient statistics, according to Health Forum between 1980 and 1997 number of beds in U.S. community hospitals declined by 24% with a similar reduction in length of stay (LOS) of 19%.
The human genome project expected to be completed in 2003, will have mapped the human chromosome and identified the genes that determine human characteristics. In the next 25 years we will have gene therapy to pre-treat disease, "gene chips" to alter predisposition to illness and use of chemical animals for growing replacement organs.
Baby-boomers population high cost, high healthcare users are approaching the age where historically, the U.S. has spent the majority of its health care resources. People over age 45 consume 90% of our health care dollar with 2/3s of that total being spent on those over age 65.
A minimum of 150 square feet per patient room will be the benchmark. Patient rooms will become "smarter" with in-wall analyzers to provide instantaneous biofeedback on the patient's condition.
Monitoring is already getting more universal and compact. Consider, as described in Popular Science, a "lab on a chip" a wristwatch-sized device measures infection counts and reports them to a computer will inform physician and staff when critical numbers are moving out of range.
Health Confidence Survey found that there is great confusion among respondents about managed care, jut 2 in 10 knew they were enrolled in managed care plans, with more than 6 in 10 believing that they had never been in a managed care plan. See Employee Benefit Research Institute - EBRI Web site at www.ebri.org/hcs. for copy of study.
