Shiva Sivaramakrishnan

The course offers a thorough and broad-ranging introduction to accounting theory and research. It covers origins and evolution of key relevant accounting institutions, thought, paradigms and methods. Repeatable for Credit.

As healthcare costs continue to rise at an alarming rate in U.S. over the past decade (about 20% of GDP by some accounts), issues relating cost measurement and management in the delivery of healthcare have also taken center stage. Experts in business and management have argued that extant cost systems do a poor job of measuring how much it costs to treat patients. Absent accurate measurement of these costs, many decisions could go wrong. Cost management and efficiency initiatives would be misguided, and medical reimbursements would lack proper cost bases. These concerns have triggered advances in cost measurement and management techniques that are useful not just in the healthcare setting, but also in other service organizations. The purpose of this elective is to help students develop a critical understanding of the nature of costs in healthcare delivery, their measurement in a variety of decision contexts, and how they can be managed and improved. Students will be exposed to tools such as the break-even analysis, role of cost allocations, activity-based costing, time-driven activity based costing, and cost control.