Improving the Hospital Quality of Care during Winter Periods by Optimizing Budget Allocation Between Rotavirus Vaccination and Bed Expansion

Dort, Thibaut; Schecroun, Nadia; Standaert, Baudouin

Infectious diseases in children remain a serious health problem in hospital care during each winter period in highincome countries despite the application of strict hygienic measures and better treatment procedures. Respiratory diseases and acute gastroenteritis (AGE) peak during winter leading to overcrowded pediatric wards with high bed occupancy rates exceeding 85% on average, which is the threshold for operating efficiently in hospital bedmanagement [1] [2] [3] . The temporary shock in bed-demand reduces the quality of care (QoC) because of high occupancies, discharges, and unplanned returns of patients but also because of stress in healthcare workers expressed through sick leave, extra working hours, and the enrollment of interim workers [4] . Among the covariates underlying the two principal factors (bed-and staff-management) defining the hospital QoC-scores, high bed occupancy is the main driver [4] . In addition, a high concentration of infections in hospital care will result in increased nosocomial infections and in antimicrobial resistance (AMR) [2, [4] [5] [6] [7] .