A Decision Tool for Negotiating Home Care Funding Levels in Ontario

ABSTRACT

This paper describes a decision tool created for the Sim-coe County Community Care Access Center (SCCCAC) in Ontario. The tool allows the SCCCAC to quantitatively assess the trade-offs between cost, quality, and waiting time of their home care patients. This information can then be used to negotiate reasonable funding levels with the Ontario government and to appropriately allocate this funding among the various patient groups at the SCCCAC. This work can be expanded to other health care organizations that use prioritized waiting lists.

KEYWORDS:

• Home care
• prioritized wait lists
• funding allocation
• quality
• waiting time
• queueing
• decision support system
• demand forecasting
• operations research