A computational investigation of COVID-19 transmission inside hospital wards and associated costs

TY - JOUR

T1 - A computational investigation of COVID-19 transmission inside hospital wards and associated costs

AU - Moreno Martos, David

AU - Foley, Sean

AU - Parcell, Benjamin

AU - Trucu, Dumitru

AU - Eftimie, Raluca

N1 - © 2022 the Author(s), licensee AIMS Press. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0).

PY - 2022/4/25

Y1 - 2022/4/25

N2 - The COVID-19 pandemic has placed a particular burden on hospitals: from intra-hospital transmission of the infections to reduced admissions of non-COVID-19 patients. There are also high costs associated with the treatment of hospitalised COVID-19 patients, as well as reductions in revenues due to delayed and cancelled treatments. In this study we investigate computationally the transmission of COVID-19 inside a hospital ward that contains multiple-bed bays (with 4 or 6 beds) and multiple single-bed side rooms (that can accommodate the contacts of COVID-19-positive patients). The aim of this study is to investigate the role of 4-bed bays vs. 6-bed bays on the spread of infections and the hospital costs. We show that 4-bed bays are associated with lower infections only when we reduce the discharge time of some patients from 10 days to 5 days. This also leads to lower costs for the treatment of COVID-19 patients. In contrast, 6-bed bays are associated with reduced hospital waiting lists (especially when there are also multiple side rooms available to accommodate the contacts of COVID-19-positive patients identified inside the 6-bed bays).

AB - The COVID-19 pandemic has placed a particular burden on hospitals: from intra-hospital transmission of the infections to reduced admissions of non-COVID-19 patients. There are also high costs associated with the treatment of hospitalised COVID-19 patients, as well as reductions in revenues due to delayed and cancelled treatments. In this study we investigate computationally the transmission of COVID-19 inside a hospital ward that contains multiple-bed bays (with 4 or 6 beds) and multiple single-bed side rooms (that can accommodate the contacts of COVID-19-positive patients). The aim of this study is to investigate the role of 4-bed bays vs. 6-bed bays on the spread of infections and the hospital costs. We show that 4-bed bays are associated with lower infections only when we reduce the discharge time of some patients from 10 days to 5 days. This also leads to lower costs for the treatment of COVID-19 patients. In contrast, 6-bed bays are associated with reduced hospital waiting lists (especially when there are also multiple side rooms available to accommodate the contacts of COVID-19-positive patients identified inside the 6-bed bays).

KW - COVID-19

KW - hospital transmission

KW - multiple-bed bays

KW - multiple bay wards

KW - hospital costs

KW - computational model

KW - numerical predictions

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85130255279

U2 - 10.3934/mbe.2022306

DO - 10.3934/mbe.2022306

M3 - Article

C2 - 35730269

SN - 1547-1063

VL - 19

SP - 6504

EP - 6522

JO - Mathematical Biosciences and Engineering

JF - Mathematical Biosciences and Engineering

IS - 7

ER -