An implementation on the social cost of hospital acquired infections

Hospital Acquired Infections (HAIs) are defined as infections developing in relation to health services at inpatient treatment facilities in general. Although health services improve, HAIs continue to be seen both in underdeveloped and developed countries. HAIs result in a range of negative externalities. Negative externalities include factors such as an increase in morbidity and mortality, extension of the hospitalization duration, impaired quality of life, loss of working power and performance. HAIs pose a big burden regarding population and community health care. This study aims to calculate the financial burden of HAIs by evaluating it within the scope of negative externality. The communal costs of HAIs patients were calculated by using a genuine approach with reference to samples obtained from the Duzce University Research and Application Hospital. This approach includes 4 stages and the results of each stage is sorted according to the data of 2013 as follows: (i) HAIs expenditure undertaken by the Social Security Institution is 5,832,167 TL, (ii) the monetary value of the work power loss of the HAIs patients who are at a working age is 126,154 TL, (iii) the relative cost of HAIs patients compared to a group of normal patients is 21,507 TL and (iv) HAIs patients' communal cost is 6,013,101 TL. Based on the received results, the annual communal cost of the estimated HAIs patients in Turkey is predicted to be 3,640,442,057 TL. In addition to these findings, HAIs patients experience 14 times longer in-patient stay at the hospitals as compared to normal patients, and their treatment expenditures are 23 times higher than the normal patients. In the conclusion part of the study, regarding the preventability (internalization) of HAIs, which was evaluated as part of negative externality, alternative applicable political suggestions are presented for the use of policymakers.