A meta-analysis of the risk factors for neurosurgical surgical site infection following craniotomy

Abstract

The purpose of the meta-analysis was to evaluate and compare the risk factors for neurosurgical surgical site infection (SSI) after craniotomy. Using dichotomous or contentious random or fixed effect models, the odds ratio (OR) and mean difference (MD) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were computed based on the examination of the meta-analysis results. Eighteen analyses, covering 11 068 craniotomies between 2001 and 2023, were included in the current meta-analysis. Subjects with SSIs had a significantly younger age (MD, -2.49; 95% CI, -2.95 to -2.04, p < 0.001), longer operation duration (MD, 10.21; 95% CI, 6.49-13.94, p < 0.001) and longer length of postoperative hospital stay (MD, 1.52; 95% CI, 0.45-2.60, p = 0.006) compared to subjects with no SSI with craniotomy. However, no significant difference was found between craniotomy subjects with SSIs and with no SSI in gender (OR, 0.90; 95% CI, 0.76-1.07, p = 0.23), and combination with other infection (OR, 3.93; 95% CI, 0.28-56.01, p = 0.31). The data that were looked at showed that younger age, longer operation duration and longer length of postoperative hospital stay can be considered as risk factors of SSI in subjects with craniotomy; however, gender and combination with other infections are not. Nonetheless, consideration should be given to their values because several studies only involved a small number of patients, and there are not many studies available for some comparisons.

Keywords: craniotomy; length of postoperative hospital stay; operation duration; risk factor; surgical site infection.