International Journal of Community Health Nursing

A STUDY ON NOSOCOMIAL INFECTIONS – IS ELDERLY PEOPLE ARE AT RISK? NURSE’S PERSPECTIVES

Palma-Aguirre José1, Álvarez-Etchegaray Sandra2, Meixueiro-Montes de Oca Raúl2*

jmeixueiro@pisa.com.mx

Nosocomial Infections, Elder.

Infections acquired for the period of hospital stay are generally called nosocomial infections. As incubation period varies with the type of pathogen and patients underlying condition, each infection must be individually assessed. The retrospective study was conducted in multispecialty hospital at Mexico.The data were collected from patient records and analyzed for types of infections, their causes and pathogens distribution pattern. A total of 98 records of patients admitted to Hospital, were considered and out of these 11 belonged to medical cases. The recent trends of nosocomial infection were analyzed in patients admitted in MICU of a multispecialty hospital. Clinical data were collected from patients that presented with symptoms of nosocomial infection in MICU. Incidence of nosocomial infections was 12.24%. In this 33.33% is of Urinary tract infection which is the most frequent nosocomial infection; followed by 16.67% each of Pneumonia, Infection in blood stream, Skin and soft tissue infection. Gastroenteritis and Meningitis 8.33% each. The nosocomial infection was found to be high in the age group of 40 to 60 years. The male was more prone than the female to nosocomial infections. In geriatric patients admitted to MICU are common to get Nosocomial infections. We suggest that more studies are needed to be carried out in Indian population to plan long term strategies for prevention and management of nosocomial infections. Systematic and standardized large scale studies be carried out on elderly population for prevention and management of nosocomial infections. Early detection of infections, limited and short term use of invasive devices can therefore, contribute considerably towards decreasing the incidence of nosocomial infections in elderly.