Health-care-associated infections are here to stay. Worse, the more a patient stays in the hospital, the higher the chances of acquiring them. These are the latest findings of a study presented during the recent Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy.
A team of researchers from Medical University of South Carolina reviewed infection-related cases in hospitals from 1998 to 2011. They gathered more than 900 of them, which involved a confirmation of the Gram-negative bacteria. This kind of harmful microorganism can lead to life-threatening illnesses such as pneumonia and sepsis in the blood.
Based on their studies, they discovered that a patient that stays one day longer in a hospital can acquire a drug-resistant infection from the said bacteria by 1%. Simply put, the more the patient lingers in the health care facility, the more he or she becomes vulnerable to serious infections. In fact, staying for around 10 days can already increase the susceptibility to more than 30%.
These types of infections, nevertheless, have been going on for many years. In an article published by Mercola.com, around 720,000 patients in U.S. health care facilities developed infections in 2011. More than 70,000 of them eventually died.
Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published a 2011 report about health-care-related infections. Based on the data gathered from acute care hospitals all around the United States, more than 150,000 contracted pneumonia, followed by gastrointestinal illnesses. Others developed infection in their surgical sites while 71,000 suffered bloodstream infections. Overall, more than 700,000 were reported to have been affected.
The National Patient Safety Foundation has established some recommended patient guidelines in order to minimize the infection risk. They encourage the patients to ask for medical advice whenever necessary. Patients who are also suffering from diabetes also need to coordinate with their doctor more closely since infection risk increases with high sugar level in the blood. Washing hands in health care facilities can also be a recommended way to beat infection.