医療経済的な視点で見る手術医療の現状と問題点・将来像

Current Issues and the Future of Surgical Care from the Perspective of Health Economics

はじめに

　手術医療の現状と問題点・将来像は，危機的状況で最も明瞭に現れてくると著者は考える。最近の医療における最大の危機的状況は新型コロナウイルス感染症（coronavirus disease 2019：COVID-19）パンデミックであるといっても過言ではない。そこで本論文では手術医療の現状と問題点・将来像を医療経済的な視点で見るために，COVID-19パンデミックを例として取り上げ，その危機的状況下での手術医療生産性変化を計測した。これによって手術医療の現状と問題点・将来像が明らかになることを期待する。

　The coronavirus disease 2019（COVID-19）pandemic was one of the most critical issues in recent healthcare history. We investigated the surgical productivity changes that occurred during and after the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan by examining the case of a large university hospital. The investigation revealed that the COVID-19 pandemic negatively affected the efforts to improve surgical productivity in the short term. However, the change in surgical productivity did not suffer from the state of emergency during the pandemic. Moreover, no evidence indicated that the pandemic had any lasting effects on the issue of reduced surgical productivity during the post-pandemic period. These findings’ implications for surgical practice and healthcare policy are valuable lessons for addressing future healthcare crises.