Uppsala County Council
"The project has given us an invaluable connection between our finance and production, which is usually difficult to achieve."
Adel Shalabi
Project manager & Operations manager,
Uppsala county council
Building bridges
Creating such a transparent costing model has not been easy. But everyone involved agrees that it has definitely been worth the effort.
Adel Shalabi thinks the costing model has helped them to clarify their activities, while Ann Malmberg says the costing model is a huge help to her in her operational planning and budgeting.
"Mostly it has given us an invaluable connection between our finance and production, which is usually difficult to achieve," says Adel Shalabi.
"Our new costing model describes our activities from a financial perspective. We have commoditized and calculated the cost of our activities that were previously not defined clearly enough (e.g. rounds)," says Tomas Bjerner.
"The joint model for Enköping and Uppsala has benefited collaboration in the county. This project has enabled us to have strategic discussions concerning the whole county," says Eva Telne.
A simulation tool
The Radiology Centre previously considered carrying out x-rays at night in order to increase availability and to use the equipment more evenly.
"By performing simulations in Prodacapo we realized that it was entirely possible and financially viable. Prodacapo also enables us to calculate, for example, the rental cost of waiting rooms and the effect of decreasing empty waiting rooms for the benefit of other activities," says Ann Malmberg.
Critical success factors
One of the success factors has been the very strong project management, driven by Per Kjellberg.
Per highlights the dedicated project group and its competence, the support from the management and the steering group, as well as the support from Prodacapo's consultant Eva Carlén. Per also emphasizes the steering group's contribution to resource allocation, efficient meetings and swift decisions.
"The project has taken up quite a lot of time from our daily work, but the result has been worth it!" says Adel Shalabi. "The briefings during the project process got people involved and avoided uncertainty. Involving customers at an early stage made them feel involved in the cost calculations."
Tomas Bjerner highligths the importance of the common goals, the pursuit of a holistic approach, the collective responsibility and the team members not protecting their own interests.
"My best advice to others is to come and see what we are doing!" says Ann Malmberg.
Next step
Such a transparent and activity-based costing model shows that everyone involved cares about it and wants it to stay. Next step is further maintenance, and simulation of the model.
The county council has already moved on and has started to calculate the costs at their laboratory section.
What our customers say
"Implementing Prodacapo was a strategic decision we made to respond to the new market conditions for the healthcare sector in the Netherlands."
"At the early phase of the project, some of the departments were quite hesitant in participating, but as soon as we were able to present the first results of our project the doubtfulness was replaced by enthusiasm."
Niek Bossché & Paul Steinbush
Erasmus Medical Centre, The Netherlands
"Prodacapo provides us with great information and more precise patient costing data."
"It's also very important for us to compare and analyze on different levels and in between different departments. Prodacapo gives us better management information of for example resource consumption per patient treatment."
Reidun Martine Rømo
Ekonomichef, Helse Midt-Norge
”Using Prodacapo's TDABC methodology (Time Driven ABC) means we have got a an easy-to-use costing tool, a costing model that is easy to understand and a unified method to track the patient level costs.”
Roland Ylander
Head of patient level costing, County council of Jämtland, Sweden
