Designation, diligence and drift: understanding laboratory expenditure increases in British Columbia, 1996/97 to 2005/06

Table 1 Dynamics of laboratory expenditures in British Columbia, 1996/97 and 2005/06

			% Change
	1996/97	2005/06	Overall	Average annual
Total health care services expenditures (constant $)	1,594,591,397	1,998,842,372	25.4%	2.5%
Per capita health care services expenditures	399	455	14.3%	1.5%
Total lab expenditures (constant $)	166,914,987	264,904,987	58.7%	5.3%
BC Population	3,999,520	4,383,445	9.7%	1.0%
Per capita lab expenditures	41.8	60.4	44.7%	4.2%
			% Growth attributable
Growth attributable to change in age structure			5.3%	0.6%
Growth attributable to other changes			37.4%	3.6%

Note: All numbers reflect age-standardization within broad age bands. We used a direct standardization approach, standardizing 1996/97 utilization rates to the 2005/06 population.
Notes for reading Tables 1 & 2: Rows are only additive for "expenditures per capita". For the other terms of the equation, the denominators differ by column and so it is impossible to add the values.

ISSN: 1472-6963