Category: S

A non-physician who is trained to simulate, accurately and consistently, a patient encounter for teaching and for evaluating the performance of a physician or other health care worker. This is called a “standardized patient encounter (SPE).” The SP may be a patient or simply be acting out the part.  

The measure to be applied, in a malpractice suit, to the actions of the health care professional in order to determine if the professional was negligent. The rule for determining the standard varies from state to state, but it can be generally stated that the standard of care for health care professionals is to exercise…

A term applied to various systems devised for describing the extent of tumors, both as to the tumor itself and its spread through the body, and with consequent implications as to the patient’s likelihood of survival. Some of the staging systems for bowel cancer are, for example, the Dukes system, the Kirklin system, the Astler-Coller…

One of the methods developed for taking into account a patient’s severity of illness, in addition to simply the diagnosis and surgical procedures, in predicting and analyzing the length of stay, cost, and outcome. For a number of diagnoses, objective factors have been identified by which the patient’s condition can be classified into several “stages”…

A method or device for performing staging (diseases).  

A point or period in the course of an illness. For example, many illnesses have first an acute stage which is followed by a chronic stage. For some diseases, such as cancers, the stages are specifically identified and named by processes called “staging”, with the stages important in both treatment and prognosis.  

A term which, in the context of “line and staff,” refers to positions (persons) in an organization who assist those with line authority. Those with line authority have responsibility, in an organizational hierarchy, to require those beneath them to perform tasks, and to set the standards for that performance. Staff persons have such authority only…

In the concept of “managed competition,” the sponsor is the intermediary between the purchasers of health care and the provider(s). Large employers usually serve as sponsors themselves, while the health alliance (HA) is the sponsor for small employers (and people not covered by their employment).  

A method of determining eligibility for medical assistance which originated with Medicaid. A person may not have income above a certain level to qualify for the assistance (for example, $500 per month). However, a person with an income of $600 may “spend-down” $100 per month for health care, and qualify for assistance for monthly expenses…

A special training program for internists at the University of California, Los Angeles, School of Medicine.