Think of the efficiencies in hospital supply chains, the delivery of prescription drugs, the processing of billing and insurance claims, reductions in fraud, and the application of best practices for cost controls.

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Women who gave birth naturally on average spent one day in hospital after the delivery, those who needed instruments took two days to be discharged, and those who underwent caesareans did not go home for four days on average.

BBC: One in five women has caesarean

In Bath, the hospital will refurbish 10 delivery suites, including one which has a birthing pool.

BBC: Somerset and Bath maternity units share ?1.2m grant

In medicine this workplace atmosphere, complicated by perverse economic incentives and weak systems of accountability, contributes to a hospital culture marked by a lack of a sense of communal ownership in the overall delivery of care.

CNN: Is your hospital hurting you?

Robert Harrison, the hospital's director of performance and delivery, said there was no one clear cause for the rise in patient numbers.

BBC: Harrogate hospital plea after rise in patients