ABSTRACT
Hospitals are a special place where God’s work is carried out. Patients arrive with a medical problem; they are diagnosed and treated by superstaffs of physicians, nurses, other clinicians, and those in laboratory support resources. They are given levels of care, encouragement, hope, and meaningful and emotional connections. Ideally, they leave the hospital with their problems cured. For anyone who has spent time in a hospital with a life-threatening problem, it is dif¥- cult to place a value on that particular superior patient experience and its related costs, especially when the majority of the cost is covered by medical insurance. Unfortunately, many new forces, like changes in reimbursement formulas, changing demographics, and a longer-living and more health conscious society, are disrupting the conventional healthcare model.
