Sauder School Model

The Sauder School of Business at the University of British Columbia is currently working to develop a decision support tool that shows the potential benefits of VBAC (Vaginal Birth After Cesarean), both in terms of patient outcomes and of efficient and cost-effective operation of the hospital. The tool will be transportable and applicable to the majority of BC hospitals, designed to be used by hospital administrators.

The decision support tool will take the form of a statistical model, into which users can enter information about the number and types of births at a particular hospital in a given time period. The user can then compare total actual outcomes and costs against ones that would result from different types of interventions – for example, the difference in outcomes/costs between the current practice and scenarios in which VBAC is offered to all eligible women.

Essentially, the model will attempt to forecast the impact of VBAC policies and rates on hospital costs, operations and outcomes. This will help to motivate hospitals to look at the impact of CS and VBAC at their sites. The model will assist with decision support for intervention and birth policies at a particular site. Given certain inputs and parameters based on that site’s individual data, the model will produce potential operational and cost outcomes, and illustrate the outcome statistics that could be a consequence of policy change. The goal for the model is for it to be easily transportable and adaptable to different sites, so that data and outcomes can be individualized.

When the model is finalized, information about access/distribution will be posted on this website.