I am looking for the number of hospitals in the U.S., Europe, and
Japan that are 500 bed hospitals or larger. These hospitals would
probably want to purchase my clients product. He wants to get the
rough numbers of hospitals in this category.

Any ideas?

Hello researchondemand-ga 

The America Hospital Association collects the data you are looking for
relatively to the US market. You can find the association at
http://www.ahadata.com/. 
They survey more than 6000 hospitals and you can find the list of the
information they collect at http://www.ahadata.com/docs/AS99desc.pdf
(the field between C19 and C20 is the total number of beds)
Their web page is a little difficult to navigate specially if you want
to build a query on your own.
I built a query with your requirement and found that there are 315
hospitals
that match your criteria in their list. If all you need is the number
than you have it but I imagine that you also need the name, address
and probably the phone number. For that data they charge a fee (their
system gave me an estimate of 275$ but you are better check with
them).
If you find it hard to run a query on your own you can call them at
800-821-2039 and they will run it for you and send the report.
If you are happy with a paper list then they told me that you
can find a nationwide list of hospitals and the number of beds in
the AHA Guide. The guide is available at any furnished library and
there is a different book for each year. You can also purchase the
book from them at 325$ but the library solution is much more
economical.

I have also found another book that can give you the information. The
title of the book is  "The Directory of Hospital Personnel, 2002
Edition".  http://www.healthresourcesonline.com/directories/hospital.htm
They claim that you can cross reference by "Bed Size Index" and find a
lists over 6,500 hospitals and institutions by number of beds.

 
For European and Japanese data I was only able to find a company that
sells
Worldwide Market and Technology Reports the company is IHS Medical
Data International http://www.medicaldata.com. They have a lot of
reports on Japanese and European markets, for a list of their reports
you can go at http://www.medicaldata.com/Reports/default.asp
They claim that 
"Each report includes vital information in the following areas:

Vendor Profiles 
Emerging Suppliers 
New Products & Technologies 
Market Trends 
Current Issues 
Market Share Information 
Growth Rates 
Descriptive Tables and Exhibits"

I am not sure if they have exactly what you are looking for but I
though that if your client is planning to enter these market he would
probably be interested in some of these reports.
You can also contact directly the company at 1 (800) 525-5539 (select
option 1) or 1 (303) 858-6481

There is a Japan Hospital Association that probably could provide you
the data on Japanese hospitals. Their web page is
www.hospital.or.jp/top.html but is in Japanese and I don't understand
it. I though I would point it to you in case you know somebody that
can read the language and could contact them.

For the European hospitals I found  http://www.walnut-technology.com/
They have a European Hospital Register and you can contact them at
post@WalnutMedical.info or by phone at 44 1763 223223
Once again there is probably a fee involved but I think that they can
give you the information you are looking for.

These are a few ideas, let me know if I can be of further help
silviares

---

Request for Answer Clarification by researchondemand-ga on 06 Sep 2002 14:20 PDT

Thanks for the numbers for the U.S. but I still need Europe and Japan
information. I have called IHS Health Group and their reports start at
over $500. Could you go further with this request?

---

Clarification of Answer by silviares-ga on 09 Sep 2002 20:47 PDT

Hello again and sorry for the delay in clarifying, I was out of town
and just got back.

For the European market walnut technology has free information at
http://www.walnut-technology.com/free.htm. You can specify the
European country and then "Hospital by size" and they give you the
distribution based on the number of beds. You have to look country by
country but the information is free.
Would this work for you ?

I will look further for the information about Japan but I really think
the best hope would be to contact the Japan Hospital Association. Do
you now anybody that can read or write Japanese ?
I'll keep looking

Silvia

---

Clarification of Answer by silviares-ga on 09 Sep 2002 21:19 PDT

Hi 

I found this page of the International Hospital Federation
http://www.hospitalmanagement.net/ihf/publication_5_1.html
They have 2289 Japanese hospitals in their database of which 974 have
more than 250 beds. I tried to contact them by email asking for the
number of hospitals with more than 500 beds.

I'll keep you posted 
Silvia

Some answers take a little more time and effort and this person did
the work necessary to answer my question. Good job!

Some additional info for you. 

AHA Annual Survey 2000
USA hospitals with 500 beds or more = 247 (from 4915 hospitals
surveyed)
http://www.hospitalconnect.com/aha/press_room-info/content/EdoCrisisSlides.pdf

With 600 beds and 160 doctors and staff serving 1,300 outpatients
daily, Kyoto National is the third largest hospital in the prefecture
of Kyoto.
http://www-3.ibm.com/software/success/cssdb.nsf/CS/NAVO-53FPMR?OpenDocument&Site=dmmain

The total number of inpatient beds in Japan as of October 1997 was
approximately 1.9 million including approximately 240,000 clinic beds
and 360,000 psychiatric beds. As of October 1997, there were 9,413
hospitals of all categories.
[so the average hospital in Japan has 202 beds]
http://www.jpha.or.jp/jpha/english/apha/chapter_4.html

Thanks Robert. 

Still looking for the 500 bed or more number for Japan.