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Vital Signs
Then & Now
A reminder of the pace of change, and of timeless truths, from the Spring 1986 issue of this magazine:
Dr. Ross McIntyre, then
director of Dartmouth's
Norris Cotton Cancer
Center, wrote about a 1985
visit to the Soviet Union:
"I learned that there were
more than twice as many
hospital beds per capita in
the U.S.S.R. as in the
United States . . . but that
the percentage of the gross
national product devoted to
health was about one-fifth
that of this country. The
apparent discrepancies in
statistics were resolved by
the comment made by one
observer that hospitals in
the Soviet Union were
'dormitories' for people
who didn't feel well."
Today, Russia spends 6.2% of its gross domestic product on health care, compared to 14.6% in the United States.
A reminder of the pace of change, and of timeless truths, from the 1970 Mary Hitchcock Memorial Hospital annual report:
In 1970, the MHMH Business
Office had "close to 40
people taking care of" all
financial services, using "machines
that turn out hundreds
of thousands of punch
cards, giving us information
we once had to write by
hand." Especially in the area
of patient accounting, the
report explained, "we've
come a long way. . . . When
private insurance was first
introduced, it caused a
flurry! . . . It has taken a
lot of ingenuity to keep up
with the paperwork required
by third parties."
Health-care finances, and the institution, are far more complex today; the same functions require 220 full-time-equivalent positions.
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