Payment changes require integrating records

Healthcare Financial Management, June, 1990 by Michael A. Palley

Database administrators assess an organization's overall informational needs, giving thought to compatibility before designing even special departmental applications. Modifications, including those required by a change to DRG-based payment, would be simplified in a database management system.

In the past, hospitals resisted these systems for justified reasons, such as the high cost of a fully integrated mainframe database management system and the overhead labor costs involved in a system conversion. Even so, the possibility of dramatic changes to hospital information systems in the future, along with the need to overhaul antiquated information systems, may justify the costs of database software.