This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
Rate of colectomy due to C. difficile low
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
The rate of colectomy related to Clostridium difficile infection was low and did not change significantly from 2000 to 2006, according to researchers from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.
The researchers identified patients from five tertiary care centers who underwent colectomy due to C. difficile infection from July 2000 to June 2006. The centers were participating in the CDC’s Prevention Epicenters Program. The researchers calculated the colectomy rates by using the number of colectomies related to C. difficile per 1,000 toxin-positive cases.
During the study period, there were 8,569 episodes of C. difficile infections among 8,033 patients. These episodes included 540 cases of recurrent C. difficile infection. Seventy-five patients underwent a colectomy related to C. difficile infection. The overall colectomy rate was 8.7 per 1,000 cases of C. difficile. Across the five care centers, the rate ranged from 0 to 23 per 1,000 cases of C. difficile.
The colectomy rate for health care facility-onset C. difficile infection was 4.3 per 1,000 cases; and the colectomy rate for community-onset C. difficile infection was 16.5 per 1,000 cases. Risk factors related to colectomy were being at least 65 years of age and white.
“Because of the difficulties in establishing optimal criteria on when to take a patient with C. difficile infection to surgery, our study supports the need for prospective surveillance studies to track colectomy trends in stable sentinel populations while using standardized case definitions,” the researchers wrote.
References:
- Kasper AM. Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol. 2012;33:470-476.
Disclosures:
- The researchers report no relevant financial disclosures.