Cost accounting is the process of estimating and classifying costs of healthcare incurred by governments or other organizations.
The costs are categorized under various heads e.g. salaries, material costs, radiology costs, canteen, allied services for visitors, burden costs (rent, water, electricity etc.).
References:
• WHO, 1974. Modern Management Methods and the Organization of Health Services; Geneva
• WHO, 2006 . Guidelines for conducting cost–benefit analysis of household energy and health interventions; eds: Guy Hutton,Eva Rehfuess. WHO press, Geneva.
• WHO, 2003. Who Guide to Cost- Effectiveness Analysis; Geneva
• Park’s Textbook of Preventive and Community Medicine. 24th ed, 2017, Bhanot Publishers, Jabalpur
• Usually, once a particular welfare policy is selected after CBA, Cost effective analysis is used to identify the least expensive method of attaining that definite result.
– CEA involves choosing one among different possible ways for achieving the desired result.
– E.g. it was calculated that ‘reduction in indoor air pollution’ would result in greatest economic benefit (after CBA) to the population, various possible ways of achieving this are analyzed using cost – effective analysis
• Public funds are never sufficient. Hence, there is a need to rank various projects so that the officials can select the intervention that would deliver the highest monetary return to the population
• The next ranked intervention would be considered when more funds become available or after the first one is complete
• Hence, in CBA, costs and benefits are expressed in monetary terms i.e.'cost= money spent' and 'benefit = money saved +money earned'.
Purpose of family health study in undergraduate M.B; B.S curriculum
-In a real-life situation, the students get an opportunity to see the relationship between environment and health and the health hazards arising out of environmental conditions.
-They get to learn the assessment of housing and environmental conditions at the community level. They also get an opportunity to apply the community health concepts such as safe water, waste management, vector control, and housing standards.
Puerperium: It is the period of 6 weeks immediately after delivery. In this period, the changes which took place in the organs/systems of the woman during pregnancy, come back to normal. This is also known as the post-partum period.
“Pareek’s scale” (Tables 1 and 2) was developed by Pareek for calculating the SES of a family in a rural area. It consists of nine items—caste, occupation of the HOF, education of the HOF, level of social participation of the HOF, landholding, housing, farm power (animals), material possession, and type of family.
Dietary survey is done to assess the quantities of food items and nutrients consumed by the family or an individual. The nutrition composition is calculated using tables of nutritive value of common foods. These tables are given in the ICMR publication: Nutritive Value of Indian Foods.
There are various methods of dietary survey. Each is suitable for a different set of circumstances.
It is one of the easiest and most popular methods for conducting a dietary survey. Studies have revealed that if properly conducted, the 24-hour recall method reveals reliable information regarding the food intake amount and quality.
When the food intake of a community or a group of people is to be measured, the practical problem that arises is that the group is constituted by individuals of various ages and sex groups. Each group has a different set of such groups.
To resolve this issue, it is usual to assess the needs of women and children in terms of those of the average man by applying appropriate coefficients of calorie consumption suggested for practical nutrition work in India.
