
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, November 16, 1995                   TAG: 9511160048
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: RAY REED
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

HOSPITALS BILL BY HOUR FOR SHORT STAYS

Q: I had surgery in Charlottesville recently, and the doctor wanted to be sure I spent the night in the hospital, but the insurance company didn't want to approve an overnight stay. They came up with a "23-hour observation," which looked and felt a lot like spending the night in a hospital. Why do they do it this way? It just reeks of something unusual.

B.J., Buchanan

A: Actually, a 23-hour hospital stay isn't so rare.

In your case, the cost probably wasn't much less than the normal day's stay in a semiprivate room at the University of Virginia Medical Center, where the standard rate is $384.

Normally, outpatient surgery doesn't involve an overnight stay in the hospital.

Doctors want to hold patients until they're sure their condition is stable before sending them home, and a few years ago, that meant staying for one or more days. Even if the patient needed a bed for only a couple of hours, the hospital charged for a full day.

Now, the observation time may be shortened to anywhere from two hours to almost a full day. The billing procedures have been changed so it's possible to charge on a per-hour basis.

It's a change resulting from competition with health maintenance organizations and managed-choice insurance plans. UVa has been billing this way for about a year, but the billing system has been used elsewhere in the industry for a few years.

Stickers not free

Q: Who pays for those "I voted" stickers everyone gets at the polls, and how much do they cost?

J.L., Roanoke

A: The state Board of Elections bought those stickers in October 1993 and paid $12,466 for more than 3 million copies.

They used taxpayer dollars, of course.

That figures out to a real high-volume discount. The price comes to 0.04 cents per sticker.

Put another way, we got 250 stickers for each dollar.

That amounts to $2.80 per precinct during last week's election in Roanoke, based on an average turnout of 700 voters in 33 precincts.

You might get a sticker next time you vote, too. The 3 million haven't been used up yet, said Bruce Meadows, secretary of the state board.

It was a voter awareness effort from the previous administration, Meadows said. "I don't know if it will continue."

Road isn't in plans

Q: Several years, ago a meeting was held at Crystal Spring School about a plan to widen and straighten Yellow Mountain Road. Residents in South Roanoke objected to the plan, and nothing further was heard about it. Is this upgrading still planned?

B.A., Roanoke

A: Yellow Mountain Road isn't in the plans for improvement, according to Bob Bengtson, Roanoke traffic engineer.

It's never had a high priority and never has been funded for widening, he said.

Bengtson said he doesn't remember any discussion concerning Yellow Mountain Road, but speculated it may have been included in a thoroughfare plan that really was just a "wish list," showing every desired improvement for all the city's arterial routes.

Got a question about something that might affect other people, too? Give us a call at 981-3118. Maybe we can find the answer.

by CNB