- -- <0> ---- - Episodes of care: Should we have them? DAVIDDOUGlAS, SIVA RAM VEMURI AND JIANGUO XIAo David Douglas is Associate Professor at the School of Health Sciences, Northern Territory University. Siva Ram Vemuri is Associate Dean of the School of Economics and Finance, Northern Territory University. Jianguo Xiao is a PhD Student in the School of Mathematics and Physical Sciences, Northern Territory University. In this paper the authors discuss the introduction of ' e pisodesof care: a new system for monitoring hospital-linked patient care services. They consider the proposal in the context of clinical financial and technical frameworks. The authors conclude that health planners are likely to ben e fit from the introduction of thisform of monitoring. The proposed change would also allow more accurate analysis of the true cost of interventions. However, it is likely to require significant investment in information technology and there may be lossofpatient confidentiality. For the last two decades at least, a constant factor in the Australian health care system has been the presence of change. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare detailed many of these changes in its publication Australia 's Health 1994 (1994, chapter 1). These significant changes include an increase in life expectancy, increased rates of hospital admission, increased numbers of consultations with medical practitioners, and a substantial rise in per capita health expenditure from $866 in 1982-83 to $2049 in 1992-93 (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare 1995, p 5). Palmer and Short (1994) are among others who describe in detail the recent changes to the Australian health care