A Simulation Model to Compare Strategies for the Reduction of Health-Care-Associated Infections

Cook County Hospital, like many hospitals in the U.S. and worldwide, is pursuing a developing strategy to combat healthcare-associated infections (HAIs). Annually, the human toll in the U.S. is approximately two million infected, of which over 100,000 die. An interdisciplinary team of researchers from Georgia Tech, the CDC, and Cook County Hospital, with backgrounds in engineering, economics and medicine, analyze the flow of pathogens. We combine infection rates and cost data to build a discrete event simulation model for the purpose of capturing the complex relationships between hand-hygiene, isolation, demand, and costs. We find that both hand-hygiene and isolation policies have a significant impact on rates of infection, with a complex interplay between factors. This suggests a systems-level approach to infection-control procedures will be required to contain healthcare-associated infections.