Dive Brief:
- A new CDC study published in The New England Journal of Medicine has linked C. difficile infections to healthcare environments other than hospitals. It finds that 150,000 people were infected in 2011 despite not having been in the hospital—and that of those people, 82% had been to a doctor or dentist within the 12 weeks prior to their diagnosis.
- The report indicates that overall, C. difficile was responsible for nearly half a million infections and was associated with an estimated 29,000 deaths in 2011.
- The CDC is now looking to determine whether people are acquiring C. difficile at these healthcare environments, or whether there is another reason for the connection. Other possibilities could be that the patients sought care as a result of their infections, or that patients who were prescribed antibiotics during their visit became more susceptible.
Dive Insight:
As Clifford McDonald, MD, senior author of the study, tells HealthLeaders Media: the data "should prompt more aggressive interventions by all healthcare facilities, especially with regard to more judicious and appropriate use of antibiotics, which predisposes patients to C. difficile illness."
Additional interventions may include updated approaches to cleaning healthcare facilities.
While such efforts may come with a cost, so do the infections. Treating C. difficile adds an estimated $4.8 billion a year to US healthcare costs.