Argument203=美丽G程小组=小组第十次作业by独行天下

逆风的船UID: 2724552

题目：ARGUMENT203 - The following appeared in a newspaper feature story.

"At the small, nonprofit hospital in the town of Saluda, the average length of a patient's stay is two days; at the large, for-profit hospital in the nearby city of Megaville, the average patient stay is six days. Also, the cure rate among patients in the Saluda hospital is about twice that of the Megaville hospital. The Saluda hospital has more employees per patient than the hospital in Megaville, and there are few complaints about service at the local hospital. Such data indicate that treatment in smaller, nonprofit hospitals is more economical and of better quality than treatment in larger, for-profit hospitals."
字数：514
用时：0:34:18
日期：2009-12-24


The author of this argument concluded that the treatment in the small and non-profit hospitals such as the Saluda hospital is always better than the larger profiting hospital such as the Megaville (M) hospital. In order to support his conclusion the author cited three reasons: first, the average patients stay in the Saluda(S) hospital is two days while the counterpart of the M hospital is six days and the cure rate of the Saluda hospital is twice of the M hospital; secondly, the Saluda hospital has more employees per patients than the M hospital and there are few complains about the Saluda hospital compared to the M hospital alike. Reasonable as the argument seems, there is no evidence cited by the author can convincing me that the conclusion of him or her is logically.

Firstly, the time of the average patient stay in the hospital make no sense that the S hospital is more efficient than the M hospital. As the author cited the S hospital is a local one while the M hospital is a large one. It is a common sense that people with small disease will choose the local one and most people go to large hospital under the condition of serious diseases. In the condition of curing the serious diseases, it is reasonable to take more time than the small ones averagely. This reason also undermines the other evidence provided by the author: the sure rate in the M hospital is less than the S one. For the cure rate of the serious diseases is naturally less than the small ones. In this condition the complaints got by the large hospitals may naturally higher than the small ones.

Secondly, the average number of employees per patient is also can not give support to the author's conclusion. It is a common sense that in the large hospital such as the M hospital, many doctors with higher education level would be employed. As a result the average rage of the doctors in the large hospital is higher than the small ones. So it is also reasonable that the large hospitals devote fewer employees compared to the smaller ones.

Even if the S hospital indeed provides better quality of treatment than the M hospital, we also could not get the author's conclusion. For this is only a comparison between the S hospital and the M hospital, which can not represent all hospitals allover the country, let along the common conclusion that treatment in smaller, non-profit hospitals is more economic and of better quality than in larger, for-profit hospitals.

As discussed above, the evidence provided by the author failed to back his or her conclusion. To bolster the argument the author should provide detail materials and compare the two hospitals on equal conditions. Before the comparation it is better for the author to provide the cure rate and the time of staying in hospital for the same diseases, and the average employees of a certain level per patients. In order to support the final conclusion the author should provide a well-performed survey involves more hospitals.

丢手绢UID: 2737847

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