Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, February 12, 1995                   TAG: 9502140017
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

IS HEALTH CARE THE RIGHT PRESCRIPTION?

1984 was the last year that the number of hospital admissions increased in the Roanoke Valley, Karl Miller, president of Lewis-Gale Hospital, points out.

And inpatient days are no longer even much of a measure of a health system's success because more and more medical procedures are done without overnight stays.

Who would have thought just a year ago that a patient could have bypass surgery involving seven grafts and go home in four days? A Roanoke Memorial Hospital patient did that last month.

The only guarantee in health care is that the old ways of thinking and compiling data on which to chart a facility's future won't work, the experts say.

"You can't even determine the medical component of the Consumer Price Index," notes Lucas Snipes, Carilion senior vice president, "because the CPI is based on a pricing system that involves hospital care."

"Maybe there's a diminishing in the cost of health care; we can't tell," he said. "Some experts say health care is 'just a mess.'"

What Miller and Snipes say they are certain of is that facilities are under pressure and that it will be difficult to increase the total dollars generated by health care.

That's especially true in the Roanoke region, where industry is not growing, Snipes said.

The health care industry will always be needed and always be around. But experts say the Roanoke region shouldn't bank on the industry too much when it plots its economic development future.

See today's "Peril & Promise" report on the health care business and its prospects in Horizon.