Surgical site infection surveillance: a Scottish perspective (2003-2010)

摘要

Surgical site infections (SSIs) are an important cause of healthcare associated infections (HAIs) and, in Scotland, these account for 18.6% of all inpatient HAIs (Health Protection Scotland, 2012). SSIs can have serious consequences for patients including pain, suffering and possible further surgery, and have been estimated to at least double the length of hospital stay (Coello et al, 2005).The introduction of SSI surveillance can improve the quality of patient care and provide participating hospitals with robust SSI rates in order for them to compare with similar hospitals. Evidence suggests that actively feeding back data to clinicians contributes to reductions in rates of infection (Mangram etal, 1999).