One of the most important health service issues concerns the level of provision of acute hospital beds. To assist resolution of this issue, a model is proposed which simulates how hospital beds are used in terms of admission rates and lengths of stay for different categories of disease. The model can be used to predict the likely effects of changes in the provision of beds. Thus if it is proposed to increase the supply of beds the model will estimate, by disease type, how much of an increase this will cause in admission rates and lengths of stay.
The ability of the model to accurately simulate this type of behavior is illustrated by an application in Quebec Province, Canada
