Research results show the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee's recommendations for measuring infection with multidrug-resistant organisms are useful but difficult to implement, according to an article published in Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology.
Researchers applied the SHEA/HICPAC recommendation to three hospital settings to measure MRSA infection and colonization. They tested different definitions for nosocomial incidence; the effect of excluding patients not at risk from the denominator for hospital-onset incidence; and the appropriate time period to use when including or excluding patients with a prior history of MRSA infection or colonization from nosocomial rates.
Results showed no statistically significant difference between using 72 hours or three calendar days as the cut-off to define hospital-onset incidence. There was also a statistically significant increase in MRSA rates when researchers excluded patients not at risk from the denominator when calculating hospital-onset incidence. Finally, when researchers excluded patients with a prior history of MRSA infection or colonization from nosocomial incidence rates, rates were similar in spite of whether they analyzed one, two or three years' worth of prior data.
Read the article about SHEA and HICPAC's recommendations for measuring infection.
Read other coverage about MRSA infection:
- Hospitals With Infection Control Network Decrease HAI Rates by 50%
- Contaminated Surfaces, Skin Sites Equally Likely to Cause MRSA Contamination
- Study: Electronic Prediction of MRSA More Efficient and Cost-Effective
Researchers applied the SHEA/HICPAC recommendation to three hospital settings to measure MRSA infection and colonization. They tested different definitions for nosocomial incidence; the effect of excluding patients not at risk from the denominator for hospital-onset incidence; and the appropriate time period to use when including or excluding patients with a prior history of MRSA infection or colonization from nosocomial rates.
Results showed no statistically significant difference between using 72 hours or three calendar days as the cut-off to define hospital-onset incidence. There was also a statistically significant increase in MRSA rates when researchers excluded patients not at risk from the denominator when calculating hospital-onset incidence. Finally, when researchers excluded patients with a prior history of MRSA infection or colonization from nosocomial incidence rates, rates were similar in spite of whether they analyzed one, two or three years' worth of prior data.
Read the article about SHEA and HICPAC's recommendations for measuring infection.
Read other coverage about MRSA infection:
- Hospitals With Infection Control Network Decrease HAI Rates by 50%
- Contaminated Surfaces, Skin Sites Equally Likely to Cause MRSA Contamination
- Study: Electronic Prediction of MRSA More Efficient and Cost-Effective
