Where should one search when confronted with outbreaks of nosocomial infection?

Petra Gastmeier; Sabine Stamm-Balderjahn; Sonja Hansen; Irina Zuschneid; Dorit Sohr; Michael Behnke; Ralf-Peter Vonberg; Henning Rüden

doi:10.1016/j.ajic.2006.01.014

Where should one search when confronted with outbreaks of nosocomial infection?

Am J Infect Control. 2006 Nov;34(9):603-5. doi: 10.1016/j.ajic.2006.01.014.

Authors

Petra Gastmeier¹, Sabine Stamm-Balderjahn, Sonja Hansen, Irina Zuschneid, Dorit Sohr, Michael Behnke, Ralf-Peter Vonberg, Henning Rüden

Affiliation

¹ Institute for Medical Microbiology and Hospital Epidemiology, Medical School Hannover, Hannover, Germany.

PMID: 17097458
DOI: 10.1016/j.ajic.2006.01.014

Abstract

The outbreak database (http://www.outbreak-database.com), containing 1561 records of nosocomial outbreaks published in the medical literature in a systematic format, was used to identify the most frequent outbreak sources for the entire database as well as for specific outbreak pathogens. Overall, in 37.1%, no source was identified. The main sources identified were index patients (40.3%), followed by equipment and devices (21.1%), environment (19.8%), and personnel (15.8%).

MeSH terms

Cross Infection / epidemiology*
Cross Infection / microbiology
Cross Infection / prevention & control
Databases, Bibliographic*
Disease Outbreaks / prevention & control
Disease Outbreaks / statistics & numerical data*
Humans
Infection Control / statistics & numerical data*
Risk Factors