A 2008 Medicare Policy is aiming to cut down expenses and have a much better health care system in the hospitals. They have decided not to pay hospitals extra funds for treating those diseases that could be prevented following basic measures. In addition to this, if a patient is suffering from hospital-acquired conditions including urinary tract infections (UTIs) that are caused due to the placement of bladder catheter into him, will also not be paid by them.

However, according to U-M authors, this Medicare policy is not using accurate information for identifying these complications.

On contrary, during a statewide analysis done by the University of Michigan, it has been revealed that a very minor change in regard to hospital payments has been made.

If the policy is stating not to pay for hospital-acquired catheter-associated UTIs, then it means that among all adult hospital stays in Michigan in 2009, only 5 hospital pays will be impacted.

This means, just 0.003% of all stays.

If by affecting such a little ratio of hospital stays, a much wider savings are anticipated, then this condition does not sound to be ruthless.

As said by lead author Jennifer Meddings, MD, MSc, an assistant professor in the Department of Internal Medicine, Division of General Medicine at U-M Medical School, "We think the policy was well intended but its financial savings from non-payment for catheter-associated UTI are negligible because of the data used to implement the policy".