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Health economics research led by the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and the University of Melbourne has found sepsis can double the costs of cancer care. The study, published in PLoS One, used Canadian data to track the impact of the overall use of public health services by more than 75 000 cancer patients with sepsis over 5 years. The researchers estimated the short and long term costs of their care. For example, the additional cost of caring for a patient with a solid tumour who developed sepsis was more than CA$60 000 over 5 years, and over CA$75 000 for a patient with blood cancer. "By quantifying the economic burden of sepsis in cancer patients we have an indication of the extent of the costs associated with sepsis, and this can be used to better align resources for more efficient care of our patients," said lead author and health economist Dr Michelle Tew. "While it was using Canadian data, the similarities between our health care systems, occurrence of cancer and treatment strategies, means we believe these results are also valuable to the Australian context," said senior co‐author Professor Andrew Morris, an infectious disease physician at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, Canada.