B.C. Health Minister Kevin Falcon is expected to introduce a bill on Monday that will change health-care funding in the province. (CBC)

Hospitals in British Columbia are expected to start operating more like private businesses under upcoming reforms that include rewarding facilities for treating more patients and cutting wait times.

Health Minister Kevin Falcon is set to introduce so-called patient-based funding that he said would increase productivity, efficiency and quality of care.

Falcon, who wouldn't comment on the plan until he unveils it on Monday, is also expected to announce the formation of a new organization that oversees the implementation of future health funding in B.C.

Since 2008, the Health Ministry has developed several pilot projects that involve increasing patient services at emergency rooms, breast cancer clinics and orthopedic surgeries.

Health officials point to four rapid access breast cancer clinics in the Vancouver area that aim for a breast cancer diagnosis within 21 days and a March 2009 project that rewards hospitals that reduce patient bottlenecks in their emergency rooms.

But the Hospital Employees Union and the Opposition New Democrats say it appears the government is preparing to force hospitals to compete with each other for services and the outcomes won't be positive.

HEU spokeswoman Judy Darcy said facilities that vie for hip and knee surgeries may end up downgrading services for difficult and time-consuming health issues like heart conditions and chronic illnesses.

"What would be very worrisome and disappointing is if government forces hospitals to compete with each other for patients and funding and then establishes a whole new bureaucracy in order to oversee that scheme," she said.

"Under a model like that, in order to maximize funding, we could see hospitals do what private clinics do, which is compete for low-cost, high-volume procedures, and abandon the less profitable services."

Adrian Dix, health critic for the Opposition NDP, said it appears the government is about to introduce another level of bureaucracy to the health-care system when what is needed is more collaboration to ensure improved services.

"It's more bureaucracy," he said. "Forcing health authorities to compete around the edges instead of collaborating more effectively may or may not be the right way to go. Our experience tells us, on the ground, it's not the right way to go."

Falcon's funding reforms come at a time when the government is looking to cut rising health-care costs, saying the current pace is not sustainable.

He suggested he is considering offering health tourism packages to rich Americans and Europeans who want to come to B.C. hospitals for specialized treatments at gold-plate payment rates.

The Liberals recently increased health spending by $2 billion over three years in last month's budget, bringing the total health budget to more than $16 billion, almost 43 per cent of the total budget.

Last week, health authorities were told to cut 10 per cent from their $450-million public-health budget to cover such tasks as restaurant inspections.

Health authorities face multimillion-dollar deficits and are cutting costs to bring budgets under control.