Epidemiologic characteristics of health care-associated outbreaks and lessons learned from multiple outbreak investigations with a focus on the usefulness of routine molecular analysis - PubMed (original) (raw)

. 2018 Aug;46(8):893-898.

doi: 10.1016/j.ajic.2018.01.027. Epub 2018 Mar 16.

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Epidemiologic characteristics of health care-associated outbreaks and lessons learned from multiple outbreak investigations with a focus on the usefulness of routine molecular analysis

Hajime Kanamori et al. Am J Infect Control. 2018 Aug.

Abstract

Background: Single outbreaks have often been reported in health care settings, but the frequency of outbreaks at a hospital over time has not been described. We examined epidemiologic features of all health care-associated outbreak investigations at an academic hospital during a 5-year period.

Methods: Health care-associated outbreak investigations at an academic hospital (2012-2016) were retrospectively reviewed through data on comprehensive hospital-wide surveillance and pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) analysis.

Results: Fifty-one health care-associated outbreaks (annual range, 8-15), including 26 (51%) outbreaks in intensive care units (ICUs), and 263 infected-colonized patients involved in these outbreaks were identified. The frequency of pathogens varied by affected location, specifically multidrug-resistant organisms (20/26 outbreaks, 77% in ICUs vs 2/25 outbreaks, 8% in non-ICUs; P < .0001) and gastroenteritis because of Clostridium difficile, norovirus, or adenovirus (1/26 outbreaks, 4% in ICUs vs 17/25 outbreaks, 68% in non-ICUs; P < .0001). Outbreaks occurred in approximately one-third of all units (37%) with some repeated instances of the same pathogens. Of 16 outbreaks caused by a bacterial pathogen evaluated by PFGE, 12 (75%) included some indistinguishable strains, suggesting person-to-person transmission or a common source.

Conclusions: This study demonstrated epidemiologic characteristics of multiple outbreaks between ICUs and non-ICUs and the value of molecular typing in understanding the epidemiology of health care-associated outbreaks.

Keywords: Health care–associated infection; Nosocomial; Outbreak; Pulsed-field gel electrophoresis.

Copyright © 2018 Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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