Cost-effectiveness Analysis of Feeding Guidelines for Infants Following Intestinal Surgery

The aim of the study was to determine the cost-effectiveness of postoperative feeding guidelines to reduce complications in infants with intestinal surgery compared to standard feeding practices.

Using outcomes from a cohort study, Markov models from health care and societal perspectives simulated costs per hospitalization among infants fed via guidelines versus standard practice. Short-term outcomes included intestinal failure-associated liver disease, necrotizing enterocolitis after feeding, sepsis, and mortality. Effectiveness was measured as length of stay. The incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICER) compared cost over length of stay. Univariate and multivariate probabilistic sensitivity analyses with 10,000 Monte Carlo Simulations were performed. A second decision tree model captured the cost per quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) using utilities associated with long-term outcomes (liver cirrhosis and transplantation).

In the hospital perspective, standard feeding had a cost of $31,258,902 and 8296 hospital days, and the feeding guidelines had a cost of $29,295,553 and 8096 hospital days. The ICER was $-9832 per hospital stay with guideline use. More than 90% of the ICERs were in the dominant quadrant. Results were similar for the societal perspective. Long-term costs and utilities in the guideline group were $2830 and 0.91, respectively, versus $4030 and 0.90, resulting in an ICER of $-91,756/QALY.

In our models, feeding guideline use resulted in cost savings and reduction in hospital stay in the short-term and cost savings and an increase in QALYs in the long-term. Using a systematic approach to feed surgical infants appears to reduce costly complications, but further data from a larger cohort are needed.