Direct health care costs and length of hospital stay related to health care-acquired infections in adult patients based on point prevalence measurements

Abstract

Background The incidence of health care-acquired infection (HAI) and the consequence for patients with HAI tend to vary from study to study. By including all patients, all medical specialties, and performing a follow-up analysis, this study contributes to previous findings in this research field. Methods Data from the Swedish National Point Prevalence Surveys of HAI 2010-2012 was merged with cost per patient data from the county Health Care Register (N = 6,823). Extended length of stay (LOS) and costs related to an HAI were adjusted for sex, age, intensive care unit use, and surgery. Results Patients with HAI (n = 732) had a larger proportion of readmissions compared with patients with no HAI (29.0% vs 16.5%). Of the total bed days, 9.3% was considered to be excess days attributed to the group of patients with an HAI. The excess LOS comprised 11.4% of the total costs (95% CI, 10.2-12.7). The 1-year overall mortality rate for patients with HAI in comparison to all other patients was 1.75 (95% CI, 1.45-2.11), all 5 of these differences were statistically significant (P