The efficiency in the ordinary hospital bed management in Italy: an in-depth analysis of intensive care unit in the areas affected by COVID-19 before the outbreak

Fabrizio Pecoraro; Fabrizio Clemente; Daniela Luzi

Starting from these premises, the aim of this study is to analyse the Italian regional hospital systems in order to assess the efficiency and the performance of the hospital bed management in the years that precede the COVID-19 outbreak. Specific attention is given to the management of the intensive care unit departments. In this perspective, there are two methodologies adopted to assess the efficiency of a health structure in the management of clinical hospitalized cases: the first one is the hospital bed management [8] [9] [10] that provides an overall description of the use of beds by health structures. The second methodology evaluates the performance of a hospital considering the complexity of the cases treated by the structure [11] [12] . Both methodologies investigate hospital performances providing a helpful snapshot for healthcare managers for the evaluation of healthcare systems [13] .