A study published in the Journal of Hospital Medicine shows clinical history, especially a history of immunodeficiency, is a better diagnosis tool for Clostridium difficile in pediatric patients than patient symptoms.
Looking at retrospective data, researchers found immunodeficiency was much more frequent in C. diff patients than in the control group, at 46 percent and 6 percent, respectively. Additionally, 24 percent of C. diff patients had been recently hospitalized and exposed to antibiotics, compared to only three percent of the control group.
The data also show symptomatic abdominal pain reported at time of admission was more common in the control group, while more C. diff patients had a history of gastrointestinal disease, GI surgery or abdominal surgery.
The number of patients with diarrhea is comparable between the two groups, suggesting diarrhea itself is not necessarily an indicator of a C. diff infection.
The authors suggest a history of immunodeficiency and persistent GI factors could be strong indicators of C. diff, even when traditional risk factors like recent hospitalization are absent. They also suggest using these factors to create an assessment tool could aid physicians in C. diff diagnoses.
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