Pediatric meningococcocal meningitis in the acute phase: how much does it cost?

Abstract

BackgroundMeningococcal meningitis (MM) is known to be responsible of high cost for the Public Health Administration. Aim of the work is to calculate the costs for the hospitalization of pediatric patients affected by MM.MethodsWe calculate the costs for the hospitalization of pediatric patients affected by MM in the acute phase (HAP) over a nine year period. We performed a MEDLINE search to verify the cost of MM HAP reported in other studies.ResultsAt Bambino Gesù Children Hospital, the median cost of HAP was of 12,604 euro (range from 9203 to 35,050 euro). Comparing our data with the previous studies, we find out similar results of approximately 16,750 euro (range 12,000–20,000 euro).DiscussionDespite the relative rarety of the disease, MM is associated to direct high cost of HAP.ConclusionsHospital costs are an important end-point in health economic evaluation of the disease and may be useful to policy makers and health economists to understand the potential benefit of improving meningococcal vaccination programmes.

Paediatric bacterial meningitis in the USA: outcomes and healthcare resource utilization of nosocomial versus community-acquired infection

“…It is important to note that these do not represent the only studies of the healthcare economics of paediatric BM. Outside the USA, there have been previous studies of the topic in Italy [12], the Netherlands [13], Turkey [14], South Australia [15] and Taiwan [16], for example, but they are typically limited either to single institutions or single bacterial etiologies (and sometimes aggregate cost analyses of BM with non-meningitis manifestations of those etiologies).…”

Clinical and economic estimation of children’s pharmacotherapy with meningococcial infections in Ukraine

“…The total cost of consumed treatment amounted to an average USD 136.8 per 1 patient. In researches of Italian scientists (Bozzola et al 2019), the cost of treatment for children with meningococcal meningitis was 26 to 9329 EUR per patient.According to the ABC / VEN-analysis, a rational approach to pharmacotherapy has been identified, since group A includes classes V and E recommended by the Clinical Protocol. However, by the number of appointments, 64.4% are occupied by secondary drugs of class N, the cost of which totaled 23.4% of the funds, which requires anurgent revision.…”

Journal of Preventive Medicine and Hygiene, Vol. 62 No. 1s1 (2021): Health Technology Assessment (HTA) sull’introduzione di coorti aggiuntive per la vaccinazione contro il meningococco con vaccini quadrivalenti coniugati in Italia

“…Recentemente è stato pubblicato uno studio italiano che ha valutato i costi del ricovero nella popolazione pediatrica [ 27 ]. La ricerca ha analizzato le cartelle cliniche di 32 pazienti ricoverati all’ospedale pediatrico Bambino Gesù di Roma nel periodo 2006-2015.…”

“…Un recente studio italiano ha stimato un costo medio in € 14.874. Stratificando il dato per fasce di età, il costo medio dei pazienti di età < 1 anno era di € 17.306, valore superiore a quello riferito ai bambini di età compresa tra 1 e 5 anni (€ 13.313), ai bambini di età 5-10 anni (€ 15.025) e ai pazienti di età > 10 anni (€ 14.059) [ 27 ]. A questi costi della fase acuta si aggiungono i costi della risposta di Sanità Pubblica finalizzata ad evitare casi secondari di malattia e gli ingenti costi diretti e indiretti delle sequele a breve e lungo termine (vedi capitolo 4 ).…”