Epidemiologic evaluation of postoperative wound infections in dogs and cats.

摘要

Signalment, nutritional status, surgery duration, surgical procedures, wound contamination classification, interval from clipping until surgery, blood pressure values, active infection at a distant site, endocrinopathy, and administration of immunosuppressive medications or antibiotics were recorded in an epidemiological study of 1574 postoperative wounds in 1255 dogs and cats. Postoperative infection was evident in 86 of 1574 (5.5%) wounds, including 54 of 1146 (4.7%) and 13 of 259 (5.0%) animalswith clean and clean-contaminated wounds, respectively, and 12 of 100 (12.0%) and 7 of 69 (10.1%) animals with contaminated and dirty wounds, respectively. Animals with clean wounds that received antibiotics other than as prescribed in the perioperativeprotocol had a higher infection rate than animals that did not receive antibiotics. Surgical sites clipped before anaesthetic induction were 3 times more likely to become infected than sites clipped after induction. Risk of wound infection increased withincreasing duration of surgery. Wound contamination categories had too much variation to make them useful for predicting animals that would develop wound infections. It is suggested that surgical sites should be clipped immediately before surgery, and operative time should be kept to a minimum. Unless indicated for other current active infection, prolonged use of antibiotics after surgery should be avoided in animals with clean wounds.