Inference and control of the nosocomial transmission of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus

Pei, Sen; Morone, Flaviano; Liljeros, Fredrik; Makse, Hernán; Shaman, Jeffrey L

The contact network is time-varying and exhibits high spatiotemporal complexity. The daily inhospital patient number fluctuates between 4000 and 7000 during the study period ( . Moreover, about 100 connected components coexist in the contact network each week (Figure 1-figure supplement 2D ). Connections between different connected components change over time due to the transfer and readmission of patients. 128,119 patients were transferred from one ward to another during their stay, and another 280,506 patients were readmitted within 1 year of their previous discharge. These patient movements connect healthcare facilities that would otherwise be isolated in the network and facilitate long-range transmission across multiple hospitals. A direct consequence of this patient movement is difficulty tracking the indirect transmission path of MRSA across different hospitals. For instance, a patient located in one hospital can be involved in the transmission occurring in another when he/she moves across multiple facilities. Detailed analyses of the contact network structure and hospitalization traffic can be found in Appendix 1.