Caring for Accounting - a study of the use of accounting information in a hospital clinic

Sammanfattning: This thesis explores the role of accounting for decision-making in a healthcare setting, more specifically within a hospital clinic, using a single qualitative approach to receive an in-depth understanding of how and where accounting information is used. A developed research stream within previous research uses professional roles as a central explanatory factor when it comes to attitudes and behaviours towards increasing uses of accounting information. However, receiving indications that interesting findings exploring the use of accounting may not be found with this perspective, the focus is somewhat turned to receive a more granular understanding of the use of accounting in different situations: treatment choice, operational resource management and strategic resource allocation. For the analysis, the framework presented by Burchell et al. (1980) is used to better understand the different uses of accounting information in a clinic setting. Thus, our findings have managerial implications as they indicate that accounting tools should be adapted to the situation in terms of how and where it is used. In practice, these findings can be applied for managers in creating ways to control operative work in a healthcare setting. Further, the findings also point to an interesting future research stream, within the research of accounting in the public sector, which explores the role of accounting for decision-making in a more differentiated way than has previously been observed.