Clostridium difficile caused nearly half a million infections in U.S. patients in 2011, and about 29,000 patients died within 30 days of the C. diff diagnosis, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"In the past, patients infected with C. diff have had diarrhea that was often perceived as a nuisance but not a major problem," said Michael Bell, MD, deputy director of CDC's Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion, during a CDC phone briefing. "Unfortunately the type of C. diff circulating in the U.S. today produces such a powerful toxin that it can cause a truly deadly diarrhea."
About 15,000 of the 29,000 deaths were directly attributable to the C. diff infection, according to the CDC. Risk of infection and death increase with age: two out of every three healthcare-associated C. diff infections occur in patients 65 or older, and more than 80 percent of C. diff-associated deaths occurred in Americans in that age group.
"These infections can be prevented by improving antibiotic prescribing and by improving infection control in the healthcare system," said CDC Director Tom Frieden, MD. "CDC hopes to ramp up prevention of this deadly infection by supporting State Antibiotic Resistance Prevention Programs in all 50 states."
A CDC study showed that decreasing the use of antibiotics linked to C. diff infections in hospitals could reduce the infections by more than 25 percent in hospitalized and recently released patients.
The CDC offers a variety of tools to help hospitals build antibiotic stewardship programs. Find the core elements of one of the programs here, and a checklist here.