Testing patients for three risk factors at admission can identify almost three out of four asymptomatic carriers of C. difficile, according to a study in the American Journal of Infection Control.
Mayo Clinic researchers tested 320 patients who showed no sign of C. difficile at admission, and found 31 cases of colonization. Researchers were then able to identify recent hospitalization, chronic dialysis and corticosteroid use as predictors of C. difficile colonization, and determined screening patients with at least one of these risk factors would have identified 74 percent of the carriers.
"While more research needs to be conducted on the transmission of C. difficile infection from colonized patients, this study may help institutions with persistently high rates of transmission develop an expanded strategy for targeted C. difficile surveillance," said Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology President Patti Grant, RN, BSN, MS, CIC, in a news release.
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Mayo Clinic researchers tested 320 patients who showed no sign of C. difficile at admission, and found 31 cases of colonization. Researchers were then able to identify recent hospitalization, chronic dialysis and corticosteroid use as predictors of C. difficile colonization, and determined screening patients with at least one of these risk factors would have identified 74 percent of the carriers.
"While more research needs to be conducted on the transmission of C. difficile infection from colonized patients, this study may help institutions with persistently high rates of transmission develop an expanded strategy for targeted C. difficile surveillance," said Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology President Patti Grant, RN, BSN, MS, CIC, in a news release.
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