The Cost Based Activity has been a promising alternative to deal with the complexity that characterizes hospital costs. In the last ten years, only in the Plataforma Lattes, more than a hundred studies of this nature had been found. This work aims to find out, empirically, the use of ABC Costing in Brazilian university hospitals and to compare the results, according to the possibilities, with the researches that have been made in the biggest Brazilian companies by the authors: Khoury (1999), Beuren and Roedel (2002) and Azevedo, Santos and Pamplona (2004). A hundred and fifteen questionnaires were sent to the university hospitals, 34 had been answered. The study relates important conclusions: The current cost systems of the hospitals have few conditions to supply useful information to the management; the ABC Costing is enough known in the hospital area, but the number of users is still relatively small: only 15% of the sample; but there is a expectation on the part of 44% of the hospitals regarding the future use of the boarding. The main causes presented for not-using the ABC Costing had been: (a) the system in use serves the necessities of the organization and (b) the Activity Based Costing is very complex.
Cost; Hospitals; Brazil
