PERFORMANCE, CHARACTERISTICS, AND CASE MIX IN JAPANESE AND AMERICAN TEACHING HOSPITALS

The studies of Iglehart, Ikegami, and Yoshikawa1-3 have described the Japanese health care financing and delivery system. However, answers as to why Japan only spends 6.8% of its gross domestic product on health care,4 while having more hospitals and beds than the United States, no apparent limits on universal access to care, and maintaining a mostly private fee-for-service provider system, have remained largely speculative. To begin to shed light on differences between Japan and the United States at a institution-specific rather than national