Publication:

Identifying risk factors for surgical site infections in abdominal surgeries and establishing common pathogenic bacteria

Background Infections that occur in the wound created by an invasive surgical procedure are generally referred to as surgical site infections (SSIs). SSIs are one of the most important causes of health care associated infections. Aims of the study was to study surgical site infections following abdominal surgeries.

Methods A hospital based prospective observational study was conducted on patients operated on elective and emergency basis admitted to the hospital, the study was conducted for one year in 813 cases influence of various risk factors in developing surgical site infections and the outcome were studied.

Results A total of 813 patients were studied, out of which 587 were Elective cases and 226 were Emergency cases. Out of 587 elective cases 34 cases developed SSI. Among 226 emergency cases 40 cases developed SSI. The overall wound infection rate was 9.10%. Study shows higher rate of infection in dirty wounds (75%) when compared to contaminated (7.58%), clean contaminated (8.71%) and clean wounds (5.48%) respectively. prolonged operation duration more than 3 hours, out of 195 cases 32 developed SSI. Among 74 cases of wound infection, gram negative bacilli were very often responsible for postoperative wound infection than gram positive organisms. the mean postoperative stay of patients who developed SSI increased by 3.54 days when compared to the rest of the cases.

Conclusions Staphylococcus species were most frequently isolated, next in order are E. Coli, Klebsiella, and Proteus then comes Pseudomonas. Surgical site infections were associated with increased hospital stay and thereby increasing health care expenditure and morbidity.