Infections in US hospitals kill 48,000 and cost billions

Nearly 50,000 US medical patients die every year of blood poisoning or pneumonia they picked up in hospital, a study has shown.

Hospital-acquired sepsis and pneumonia in 2006 claimed 48,000 lives, led to 2.3 million extra patient-days in hospital and cost 8.1 billion dollars, according to the study, led by researchers from the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy at Washington-based Resources for the Future.

Together, the two hospital-acquired infections -- also called nosocomial infections -- account for about one-third of the 1.7 million infections US patients pick up every year while in hospital, the study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine on Monday shows.

They are also responsible for nearly half of the 99,000 deaths a year from hospital-acquired infections reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100223/hl_afp/healthusmedicine

Right? :think:

its a medical and hygiene problem rather than a political one.

yet, instead of reforming our anti-biotic use in feed animals, or teaching pediatricians to stop giving antibiotics for the slightest cough, OR insuring that infections diseases is the second most important department in every hospital, or policing the bad doctors that ruin it for the rest of profession,

the response is to take away access to the courts be protecting the guilty - except they call it Tort Reform.

A shocking number of people absolutely demand that they walk out of every visit with a script. They will hear none of it when you explain that antibiotics do no good for the common cold. They will spend seven minutes telling you about how their old doctor always gave them a prescription and the cold always went away so they know it works.

If I walk into a pizza shop and say "but the other pizza shop gives me two pizzas for that price," the guy at the counter doesn't feel compelled give me two pizzas.

If an over-prescribing doctor's only excuse is "but they asked me for antibiotics for seven minutes," then the doctor needs to spend a few weekends making pizza, to learn how to resist such insidious pressuring.


Although the patients should certainly be educated about the specific and limited value of antibiotics, it's ultimately up to the doctor--who has been educated about this--to point out when the prescription is inappropriate.

two different infections that took over a month to kill. for two weeks i changed my bandages at home. the infection resulted in the removal of an implant and a 20,000 hospital bill that they refused to pay. my insurance paid 12,000.....

i was one of the lucky ones.....

had a major back operation a few months back, then, came down with a cellulitis infection in the leg that threatened all the hardware they installed. Emergency IVs, heavy doses for two weeks, and the swelling finally went down. Even now, that leg feels pain and/or numbness that simply won't go away.

The ER doc said, "80-90% chance that you got this while you were hospitalized."

gee, great.

dirty organisms and patients in the hospital are generally in a weakened condition and in positions where they are susceptible to many common infections.

it happens in all health care situations in all countries:

In the United States, it has been estimated that as many as one hospital patient in ten acquires a nosocomial infection, or 2 million patients a year. Estimates of the annual cost range from $4.5 billion to $11 billion and up. Nosocomial infections contributed to 88,000 deaths in the U.S. in 1995. One third of nosocomial infections are considered preventable. Ms. magazine reports that as many as 92 percent of deaths from hospital infections could be prevented.<3> The most common nosocomial infections are of the urinary tract, surgical site and various pneumonias.<4>

In France, prevalence in a sample of hospital patients was 6.7% in 1990, and the rate of nosocomial infections was 7.4% (patients may have several infections).<5> At national level, prevalence among patients in health care facilities was 6.7% in 1996<6>, 5.9% in 2001<7> and 5.0% in 2006.<8>. The rates for nosocomial infections were 7.6% in 1996, 6.4% in 2001 and 5.4% in 2006.

In 2006, the most common infection sites were urinary tract infections (30,3 %), pneumopathy (14,7 %), infections of surgery site (14,2 %). infections of the skin and mucous membrane (10,2 %), other respiratory infections (6,8%) and bacterial infections / blood poisoning (6,4 %).<9>

The rates among adult patients in intensive care were 13,5% in 2004, 14,6% in 2005, 14,1% in 2006 and 14.4% in 2007.<10>

It has been estimated that nosocomial infections make patients stay in the hospital 4-5 additional days. Around 2004-2005, about 9,000 people died each year with a nosocomial infection, of which about 4,200 would have survived without this infection.<11>

In Italy, in the 2000s, about 6.7 % of hospitalized patients were infected, i.e. between 450,000 and 700,000 patients, which caused between 4,500 and 7,000 deaths.<12> A survey in Lombardy gave a rate of 4.9% of patients in 2000.<13>

In UK, they have been estimated as 1/10 in-patients. <14>

In Switzerland, extrapolations assume about 70,000 hospitalised patients are affected by nosocomial infections (between 2 and 14% of hospitalized patients).<15> A national survey gave a rate of 7.2% of patients in 2004.<16>

The rate of nosocomial infections was estimated at 8.5% of patients in Finland in 2005<17>, and 8.2% in England in 2006.<18>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosocomial_infection#Epidemiology

or Meds that conflict with each other.

Health care professionals washing hands properly is still the best way to reduce the risk.


I witnessed the rather lackadaisical prophylaxis to MRSA at a top rated hospital. In spite of the fact that the patient was at high risk for pneumonia, she was housed in the same 6-room intensive care unit as several patients with MRSA (big sign on their doors.) What a surprise that the MRSA traveled across the hall. When someone dies from a nosocomial infection in hospital, it's rarely report as such. Rather, the death is listed as a "complication" of whatever landed the person in the hospital in the first place. Furthermore, in many states there is only voluntary reporting if the nosocomial infection presented after the patient is discharged. I wonder how much under-reporting there is nationwide.

spends any time on a ventilator or has invasive lines/equipment is at great risk, certainly. There are so many portals for bug entry (take urinary catheters--supposed to be a "sterile" insertion procedure, but nobody's urethra is sterile--you are just shoving bacteria into the bladder directly), so many different kinds of personnel entering room after room spreading God knows what even when they wash their hands, and then there are visitors and whatever they bring in--add to this a patient's body that is mostly immobile (fluid/mucus stagnate in the airway and lungs), undergoing tremendous internal stress, and probably a weakened immune system. Just not surprising that it's such a terrible problem.

They're not mopping the floors or wiping down surfaces with antiseptics very often. They don't have enough orderlies to bathe patients. They're not changing bedsheets, they're not giving the nurses enough latex gloves to be able to change gloves every time they switch to treating a different patient, and every time someone complains that this is endangering patients, the PHBs threaten to make 'em the next ones laid off.

I found to be housed in one of the hospital rooms I have seen for the past 15 years....especially in the inner cities. 2 of my daughters and a sister are RNs and I know of what I speak.

Hell, if my history is correct, the first hospitals were places where people went to die, not to get healed. Has anything changed? :evilgrin: