Infectious Disease Reports (Jun 2010)

Mortality in hospitalized older adults associated with Clostridium difficile infection at a district hospital

  • Johannis Andreas Karas,
  • Simon Bradshaw,
  • Wabas Mahmud,
  • David A. Enoch

DOI
https://doi.org/10.4081/idr.2010.1824
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 2, no. 1
pp. e8 – e8

Abstract

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Clostridium difficile is the most common cause of hospital acquired infectious diarrhea in the developed world and has re-emerged in recent years with apparent greater morbidity and mortality. Despite this, there is little recent published data from the UK concerning associated mortality. We performed a case control study at a UK district general hospital of 66 hospitalized patients over the age of 65 years with C. difficile infection compared to 3-5 controls matched for age, sex and minimum length of stay. We found a significant excess mortality of 11.5% at seven days, 26.2% at 30 days, 38.1% at 90 days and 41.4% at 180 days. C. difficile infection in hospitalized elderly patients may contribute to long-term mortality or be a marker of poor prognosis and cases may require more intensive long-term follow up to improve mortality.

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