The provision for risks and charges of public healthcare companies: An analysis of a national context

Abstract

The increase in claims for compensation by patients to public healthcare companies highlights the key role of the provision for risks and charges. The resources set aside in the provision for risks determine the ability to cover losses or debts of determined nature, of certain or probable existence, of which, however, either the amount or the date of occurrence is undetermined. The research aims to identify the evolutionary trend of the provision of risk in national public healthcare companies. Moreover, it forecasts the future trend of provision for risks divided per the protection of civil liability towards third parties model. The research adopts a quantitative methodology to facilitate replicability and to investigate the trend of the provision for risks of a national public healthcare context, i.e., Italian public healthcare context. The research data set includes accounting information collected by websites of healthcare facilities in order to comprehend the evolutionary trend of the provision for risks. The results of the research describe a stable trend in the resources set aside in the provision for risks, a continuous decrease in the use of the provision for risks with a consequent increase in the fund itself, and a discontinuous trend in the percentage ratio between the annual provisions for the risk and the fund itself.