Many people are not clear about the difference between hospital, clinic and sanatorium . If you are one of them, we hope that reading this post clears up your doubts because we are going to explain what each of these concepts consists of.
To see the differences between these three institutions, let’s start by reading the definition of each of them:
Hospital: Establishment intended for medical diagnosis and treatment of patients, where research and teaching are often practiced.
Clinic: Health establishment, generally private, where a patient’s illness is diagnosed and treated, who may be admitted or treated on an outpatient basis.
Sanatorium: Establishment conveniently arranged for the stay of patients who need to undergo medical, surgical or climatological treatments.
Differences between hospital and clinic
Ownership is one of the differences between a hospital and a clinic. The main difference between a clinic and a hospital is that they telemarketing list providers are usually private; hospitals can be public, private or mixed. Specifically in Spain, public hospitals represent 45% of the total the rest are private or subsidized, although sometimes patients are referred to them from the public health system.
Price
As a general rule, hospitals are related to free health care, and clinics are related to paid care.
Schedules
The schedule is another important difference. Hospitals remain open 24 hours a day while clinics usually have limited hours although many already offer 24-hour care services.
Differences between hospital and sanatorium
Initially, the clinics were designed for outpatient diagnosis and treatment. That is, the patient went, received a diagnosis or treatment and left. In hospitals, on the other hand, there were both outpatients and inpatients. Today those differences have disappeared.
What does remain is that the hospital continues to be the place where most people go in the event of a medical emergency.
Sanatoriums are health centers that, like clinics, are usually private. Its objective is the assistance and healing of the sick. Sanatoriums are designed for long stays, unlike clinics which, as we have said, are more designed for outpatient treatments.
The first sanatoriums appeared in Book Your List Europe during the 19th century and were built to care for tuberculosis patients, who needed fresh air and to stay away from urban centers to reduce the risk of transmission of the disease.
