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HRD-83-17 1 (1982-11-24)

handle is hein.gao/gaobabdty0001 and id is 1 raw text is: 
                            WES  ICTED - Not to be released outside the General
            RELEASEL        Accounting OffIve except on the basis of specfli approvdi
                            fy fhe Office of Gongrmljoni Is_1n#


BY THE US GENERAL A(_COXUNT NG OFFCE


Report To The Ranking Minority Member

Committee On Veterans' Affairs

United States Senate






Results Of VA's Medical Care Cost

Comparison Studies Are Not Valid


Since 1977 the Veterans Administration (VA)
has conducted several cost comparison studies
which concluded that VA hospitals provide an
episode of acute medical or surgical care less
expensively than community hospitals. GAO be-
lieves the most recent studies are not adequate
to support VA's conclusions.

Despite good faith efforts to identify the relative
costs of treating veterans with acute care needs
in VA and community hoslitals, GAO believes
that the combination of data limitations, method-
ological flaws, questionable assumptions, and
errors in the VA study negate its usefulness. In
short, the VA study does not compare the costs of
treating similar patient populations in the VA and
community hospital systems.

More importantly, the VA study does not meas-
ure the difference in total costs to the Govern-
ment of the two alternatives--treating veterans
in community hospitals or VA hospitals--which,
in GAO's view, is the critical cost dimension in
any evaluation of alternatives. Thus, the study
should not be used as a basis for any decision
concerning the merits of the alternatives.

    ,  D  sT 1j



    CU


                                                                GAO/HRD-83-17
    lern T V                                                  NOVEMBER 24,1982


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