TY - JOUR PY - 2020// TI - One-year costs of intensive care in pediatric patients with traumatic brain injury JO - Journal of neurosurgery. Pediatrics. A1 - Mikkonen, Era D. A1 - Skrifvars, Markus B. A1 - Reinikainen, Matti A1 - Bendel, Stepani A1 - Laitio, Ruut A1 - Hoppu, Sanna A1 - Ala-Kokko, Tero A1 - Karppinen, Atte A1 - Raj, Rahul SP - ePub EP - ePub VL - ePub IS - ePub N2 - OBJECTIVE: Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a major cause of death and disability in the pediatric population. The authors assessed 1-year costs of intensive care in pediatric TBI patients. METHODS: In this retrospective multicenter cohort study of four academic ICUs in Finland, the authors used the Finnish Intensive Care Consortium database to identify children aged 0-17 years treated for TBI in ICUs between 2003 and 2013. The authors reviewed all patient health records and head CT scans for admission, treatment, and follow-up data. Patient outcomes included functional outcome (favorable outcome defined as a Glasgow Outcome Scale score of 4-5) and death within 6 months. Costs included those for the index hospitalization, rehabilitation, and social security up to 1 year after injury. To assess costs, the authors calculated the effective cost per favorable outcome (ECPFO). RESULTS: In total, 293 patients were included, of whom 61% had moderate to severe TBI (Glasgow Coma Scale [GCS] score 3-12) and 40% were ≥ 13 years of age. Of all patients, 82% had a favorable outcome and 9% died within 6 months of injury. The mean cost per patient was €48,719 ($54,557) (95% CI €41,326-€56,112). The index hospitalization accounted for 66%, rehabilitation costs for 27%, and social security costs for 7% of total healthcare costs. The ECPFO was €59,727 ($66,884) (95% CI €52,335-€67,120). A higher ECPFO was observed among patients with clinical and treatment-related variables indicative of parenchymal swelling and high intracranial pressure. Lower ECPFO was observed among patients with higher admission GCS scores and those who had epidural hematomas. CONCLUSIONS: Greater injury severity increases ECPFO and is associated with higher postdischarge costs in pediatric TBI patients. In this pediatric cohort, over two-thirds of all resources were spent on patients with favorable functional outcome, indicating appropriate resource allocation.
Language: en
LA - en SN - 1933-0707 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.3171/2020.6.PEDS20189 ID - ref1 ER -