although many physicians regard inpatient hospital audits with hostility, cottonwood hospital in murray, utah, was quite successful in securing the cooperation of physicians in its audits. this was done in part by emphasizing to physicians how the audits could benefit them. an attempt was made to develop a program that would keep physicians informed about audit requirements, procedures, and forms and about the information they would obtain from the audits cottonwood tries to audit those procedures that offer promise of improvement or are of interest to the physicians. for instance, the audit of vaginal hysterectomies showed that physicians were prescribing a certain antibiotic that research had shown to be ineffective in destroying the bacteria against which it was being used. hospitals beginning an audit program must establish criteria in the following broad areas: diagnosis (evidence needed to justify treatment), specific procedures, admission (whether hospitalization or outpatient treatment would be sufficient), discharge status (expected condition of patient after treatment), mortality, length of stay, cost (often varies by physician), and 'others'. all readmissions within a certain period of time after discharge are also audited. to reduce the amount of paper shuffling, cottonwood has devised a system of punched sort cards that contain all the information from patients' files. cottonwood also audits its emergency department by telephoning patients after discharge and interviewing them on the quality of care, symptoms, complications, disabilities, and other factors