An Extended Performance Reporting Framework for the Italian Healthcare Industry

Recent accounting scandals in the private and public sectors have drawn increasing attention to the shortcomings of traditional financial reporting. In an attempt to respond to these limitations, various reporting frameworks have been developed. The paper proposes a comprehensive Extended Performance Reporting (EPR) framework which integrates three different approaches, namely Intellectual Capital (IC), Balanced Scorecard (BSC) and Social and Environmental Reporting (SER). Further, this research study argues that there is a need for such an EPR framework to address industry-specific variables; in fact, most of the literature on EPR tends to be of a generalized nature and does not address specific organisational or industry-related issues.Thus, the paper develops a 'prototype' EPR framework for the Italian healthcare industry, by reviewing the different kinds of documents issued by organisations and governments and identifying the specific issues and objectives related to Italian healthcare industry.The proposed healthcare EPR framework is useful for healthcare organisations in order to consolidate and integrate SER, ICR and BSC within a comprehensive model of EPR. At the same time pilot studies in different kind of organisations within the Italian healthcare system (Public and Private Hospitals, Local Healthcare Units) are required in order to identify and test the metrics suitable for monitoring the elements included in the proposed framework