The Relevance of management accounting tools in the public hospital management in the Czech Republic

Abstract:

This study focuses on the issue of effectiveness in public hospital management in the Czech Republic. The literature related to hospital performance management suggests the use of management accounting tools positively influencing the hospital performance, but the actual scope of their use in the case of Czech healthcare has not yet been examined. This study analyzes the descriptive statistics and correlation coefficients for variables representing individual management accounting tools to identify the actual relevance of these tools and the factors influencing their significance for the public hospital managers. Despite the variability amongst the public hospitals, the results suggest the budgeting and the benchmarking being the most widely considered management practice in public hospital management in the Czech Republic with some hospital even utilizing the strategic management techniques beyond the conventional management accounting tools. Besides the evidence of management accounting tools being used, this study also discusses the environmental obstacles possibly limiting the use of these tools for the effective public hospital management which should be the focus of further research.