Hospital Size, Complexity, and Formalization

Data on 704 United States short-term general hospitals are sorted into a set of dependent variables indicative of organizational formalism and a number of independent variables separately measuring hospital size (number of beds) and various types of complexity commonly associated with size. A series of regressions are performed on the data to determine whether size alone has significant influence on formal organization. The findings are discussed in terms of the probable relation between hospital complexity and professionalization and the possible relation between professionalization and formal bureaucratic mechanisms in organization control.