CALCULATING THE COSTS OF INTER-HOSPITAL PATIENT TRANSPORT SERVICE IN TD-ABC

Inter-hospital patient transport services involve transfers between hospitals for certain hospitalization needs. Despite the diversity of patients' illnesses, this type of transport is a common service utilized by the majority of patients. The aim of this study is to develop a time-driven activity-based costing (TD-ABC) model for calculating the costs of inter-hospital patient transport. This model helps to understand the real costs of hospital care services. It also helps decision-makers make smarter decisions about how to allocate and use resources. The qualitative research approach followed in this study enabled us to understand inter-hospital patient transport services and processes. The resulting model adapts flexibly to the various inter-hospital patient transport routes by Basic Life Support (BLS) ambulance. The implementation of this model in Morocco (184.56 MAD), with a well-defined round trip (from Hospital A to Hospital B and back to Hospital A), demonstrates its validity for cost calculation. However, the TD-ABC, when applied in the context of inter-hospital patient transport, encounters several limitations, notably process mapping and time estimation, which are the primary keys to allocating the resources consumed. The results show that TD ABC provides a pricing model that considers the cost of inter-hospital transport services. It makes the value of inter-hospital transfer costs visible in the complete patient care pathway. Indeed, when the model is used for all inter-hospital journeys, it enables decision-makers to assess the distribution of costs for each patient category and the variation in costs between similar services but with different journeys.