Acquisition of Clostridium difficile from the hospital environment.
An outbreak of antibiotic-associated colitis that occurred on a ward of a Michigan hospital during February-April, 1984, was studied by bacteriophage-bacteriocin typing. Stools from the seven involved patients yielded Clostridium difficile isolates of types B1537 or Cld7;B1537. C. difficile was recovered from 31.4% of environmental cultures obtained on the ward, and the majority of isolates were types B1537 or Cld7;B1537. When the ward was disinfected with unbuffered hypochlorite (500 parts per million (ppm) available chlorine), surface contamination decreased to 21% of initial levels and the outbreak subsequently ended. Phosphate buffered hypochlorite (1,600 ppm available chlorine, pH 7.6) was even more effective; its use resulted in a 98% reduction in surface contamination. These findings suggest that environmental contamination with C. difficile is important in the epidemiology of antibiotic-associated colitis, and that hypochlorite is effective in eliminating C. difficile from the hospital environment.
Duke Scholars
Altmetric Attention Stats
Dimensions Citation Stats
Published In
DOI
ISSN
Publication Date
Volume
Issue
Start / End Page
Location
Related Subject Headings
- Middle Aged
- Michigan
- Male
- Hypochlorous Acid
- Humans
- Feces
- Epidemiology
- Epidemiologic Methods
- Environmental Microbiology
- Enterocolitis, Pseudomembranous
Citation
Published In
DOI
ISSN
Publication Date
Volume
Issue
Start / End Page
Location
Related Subject Headings
- Middle Aged
- Michigan
- Male
- Hypochlorous Acid
- Humans
- Feces
- Epidemiology
- Epidemiologic Methods
- Environmental Microbiology
- Enterocolitis, Pseudomembranous