Are MRSA Infections Really More Expensive?

When propensity scoring was used in the analysis, hospital costs were similar between MRSA and MSSA bloodstream infections.

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections are thought to have worse outcomes and higher hospital costs than methicillin-susceptible S. aureus (MSSA) infections. However, because patients who acquire MRSA infections are often sicker than those infected with MSSA, adjusting for confounding variables (i.e., variables associated both with risk for MRSA infection and with adverse outcomes) can be difficult. Traditional methods to adjust for such differences (e.g., multivariable regression) may be inadequate, so other methods have been proposed.

In a recent study involving 182 patients with nosocomial S. aureus bloodstream infections (BSIs) at a Rhode Island hospital between January 2000 and August 2003, investigators used a ne…

Reviewing Author

Daniel J. Diekema, MD, MS