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. 2017 Feb 8;4(1):ofx008.
doi: 10.1093/ofid/ofx008. eCollection 2017 Winter.

Increasing Incidence, Cost, and Seasonality in Patients Hospitalized for Cellulitis

Ryan A Peterson  1 , Linnea A Polgreen  2 , Joseph E Cavanaugh  1 , Philip M Polgreen  3   4   5
Affiliations

Increasing Incidence, Cost, and Seasonality in Patients Hospitalized for Cellulitis

Ryan A Peterson et al. Open Forum Infect Dis. .

Abstract

Using data from the National Inpatient Sample, 1998-2013, we show that hospitalizations for cellulitis have approximately doubled. Costs increased by 118% to $3.74 billion annually. In addition, hospitalizations for cellulitis are highly seasonal, peaking in summer months: incidence during the peak month of July is 35% higher than in February.

Keywords: cellulitis; cost; hospitalization; seasonality; trend..

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Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Monthly primary cellulitis hospitalizations in the United States normalized by overall admissions (top), and estimated mean differences between the number of admissions in the nadir month of February and all other months (bottom) (Nationwide Inpatient Sample, 1998–2013). Differences in means are estimated using an autoregressive structure of order one [AR(1)] model that controls for the yearly trend. *Differences in means are estimated using an AR(1) model on the log-transformed series that controls for the yearly trend.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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