Nosocomial infections

Abstract

Anosocomial infection (NI) is defined as an infection that is not present or incubating when the patient is admitted to a hospital or other health care facility.1 Generally, an infection that is discovered 48-72 h after admission is indicative of nosocomial, rather than community-acquired, infection. Although usually associated with hospital admission (hence the term hospital-acquired infection), Ms can arise after admission to any health care facility, and the term health care-associated infection is now preferred. Nosocomial infections are increasingly considered as a measure of quality of care and are the focus of safety and quality improvements efforts in many hospitals today.2-8 To date, the extent these NIs are avoidable under real-life hospital conditions and what represents the irreducible minimum remain unclear.9-11 A number of observational studies implementing multimodality strategies and standardized policies and practices have demonst rated a 10% to 70% reduction in infection rates depending on the setting, study design, type of infection, and baseline infection rates.9-15 © 2008 Springer New York.