Sepsis patients who develop hospital-onset Clostridium difficile infections experience increased mortality, lengths of stay and costs, according to a study in the Journal of Hospital Medicine.
Researchers retrospectively examined nearly 219,000 sepsis patients receiving care between July 1, 2004 and Dec. 31, 2010, using data from a multihospital database.
They found 1.08 percent of the sepsis patients developed HOCDI.
Patients who developed HOCDI had higher in-hospital mortality rates than C.diff-free controls, at 24 percent and 15 percent respectively. Additionally, length of stay for survivors with C. diff infections was on average 5.1 days longer and cost $4,916 more than the care of those without C. diff.
Researchers suggest efforts to improve clinical quality among high-risk patient populations are needed.
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