Statewide Costs of Healthcare-Associated Infections: Estimates for Acute Care Hospitals in North Carolina

Details

• Journal Article:
  Am J Infect Control
• Personal Author:
  Anderson, Deverick J. ; Pyatt, Deborah G. ; Weber, David J. ; Rutala, William A.
• Corporate Authors:
  North Carolina Department of Public Health HAI Advisory Group
• Description:
  Background
  
  State-specific healthcare-associated infection (HAI) cost estimates have not been calculated to guide Department of Public Health efforts and investments.
  
  Methods
  
  We completed a cost identification study by conducting a survey of 117 acute care hospitals in NC hospitals to collect surveillance data on patient-days, device-days, and surgical procedures during a one-year. We then calculated expected rates and direct hospital costs of surgical site infections (SSI), C. difficile infection and 3 selected device-related HAIs for hospitals and the entire state using reference datasets such as the National Heatlhcare Safety Network (NHSN).
  
  Results
  
  In total, 67 (53%) hospitals responded to the survey. The median bed size of respondent hospitals was 140 (IQR 66-350). A "standard" NC hospital diagnoses approximately 100 HAI each year with estimated costs of $985,000 to $2.7 million. The most common HAI was SSI (73%). Costs related to SSI accounted for 87% to 91% of overall costs. In total, the overall direct annual cost of these five selected HAIs was estimated to be between $124.1 and $347.8 million in 2009 for the State of NC.
  
  Conclusions
  
  Using conservative estimates, HAI led to costs of more than $100 million in acute care hospitals in the State of NC in 2009. The majority of costs were due to SSI.
  
  
• Keywords:
  Catheter-Related Infections Clostridium Infections Cross Infection Health Care Costs Hospitals Humans North Carolina Pneumonia, Ventilator-Associated Surgical Wound Infection
• Source:
  Am J Infect Control. 2013; 41(9):764-768
• DOI:
  http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ajic.2012.11.022
• Pubmed ID:
  23453162
• Pubmed Central ID:
  PMC3724767
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  K23 AI095357/AI/NIAID NIH HHSUnited States/ ; K23AI095357/AI/NIAID NIH HHSUnited States/ ; U54CK000164/CK/NCEZID CDC HHSUnited States/
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Volume:
  41
• Issue:
  9
• Collection(s):
  CDC Public Access
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:3990ea1e58d8ab9d485af2eeab9055d1d84333ce42210c66d5b813b910fc01f6a91a9654ad69343b42439bee9f1807fce64e084c4b4c105b2199cf96580a2830
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/29694/cdc_29694_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 131.44 KB ]