Hospital Infections More Likely to Lead to Deaths, Study Says

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• RAY SUAREZ:

  The numbers are sobering. The federal government estimates that each year about 100,000 people die in the U.S. after acquiring one or more infections during their stays at a hospital.

  In fact, one new study, the first to quantify the number of these infections in Pennsylvania, found that patients with hospital-acquired infections were nearly six times as likely to die as other hospital patients who did not contract them.

  Today, researchers published new findings about the causes and costs of this problem in a special issue of the American Journal of Medical Quality. Dr. Richard Shannon, of the University of Pennsylvania's Department of Medicine, is one of the authors, and he joins me now.

  We mentioned six times more likely to die, but, Doctor, in the Pennsylvania hospitals you studied, is this a widespread, common occurrence?

  DR. RICHARD SHANNON, University of Pennsylvania: Well, I think, Ray, it's very clear from the report in Pennsylvania that these infections occur far more commonly than we ever thought. And I think my own experience in my own hospital is that very recently we've recognized that these can be everyday occurrences. So, clearly, the problem is substantial.

• RAY SUAREZ:

  How do you distinguish between something that was actually caught during a hospital stay and the illnesses that a patient already had when they came through the door?

• DR. RICHARD SHANNON:

  Sure, so that in the Pennsylvania health care cost containment report, there were four classes of infections that were the principal focus: infections due to intravenous catheters placed in the vein, called central line infections; surgical site infections, in areas where a surgical wound was created; catheter-related urinary tract infections; and then ventilator-associated pneumonias, pneumonias that occur in people that are on a ventilator.

  Now, I think most people only get central catheters and only are on a ventilator in a hospital, so it's pretty easy to understand those two classes of infections. Similarly, most surgical procedures occur in the hospital, and so someone that develops a fever in a post-operative period and has an infection in their wound is pretty easy to recognize.

  I think the one area where it is somewhat controversial are the urinary-tract infections, because people at home and as outpatients can sometimes have bacteria in their bladder and be asymptomatic, and so that could well be present when they're admitted. But the overwhelming majority of the infections reported here clearly occurred while the patient was in the hospital.