Between November 1 and 22, 1985, an outbreak of acute, nonbacterial gastroenteritis occurred in a 600-bed hospital in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Illness in 635 of 2,379 (27%) staff was characterized by fatigue, nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting and had a median duration of 24-48 hours. The finding of virus-like particles measuring 25-30 nm in six stool specimens and low rates of seroresponse to Norwalk virus (3/39) and Snow Mountain agent (1/6) suggest that a Norwalk-like virus was responsible for the outbreak. The outbreak was of abrupt onset and high incidence, affecting 79 people in a single day. No common food or water exposure could be identified. The attack rate was greatest (69%) for staff who had worked in the Emergency Room. Of 100 patients and their companions who visited the Emergency Room on November 11-12 for unrelated problems, 33 (33%) developed gastroenteritis 24-48 hours after their visit, versus 0 of 18 who visited the Emergency Room on November 8 (p less than 0.001). An analysis of housekeepers who worked at least once during the period from November 9-13, which included those who became ill during the period of November 9-14, showed that the risk of becoming ill was four times greater for those who visited or walked through the Emergency Room than for those who did not (p = 0.028). These data are consistent with the possibility of the airborne spread of a virus.
APIC/CHICA-Canada Infection Control and Epidemiology: Professional and Practice Standards. Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, Inc, and the Community and Hospital Infection Control Association-Canada.
Group A streptococci account for less than 1% of all surgical wound infections but are an important cause of nosocomial outbreaks. We report here a cluster of four group A streptococcal infections that occurred within an 11-day period on a single surgical service. The index case presented with toxic shock-like syndrome. Epidemiologic investigation did not identify any relationship between infections. Restriction endonuclease analysis and M and T typing found the four isolates to be unrelated. Restriction endonuclease analysis is a useful tool for determining relatedness of nosocomial isolates of group A streptococci.
This project demonstrates the effect of increasing the skills of Community Health Aides (CHAs) on the use of specific preventive health services by women in remote Alaska villages. Eight CHAs were trained in specimen collection for Pap and sexually transmitted disease testing, and in clinical breast examination. Skill competency was monitored. Computerized medical records of all women between the ages of 18 and 75 in the four villages with trained CHAs and in four comparison villages (n = 1093) were checked for Pap status prior to CHA training and again 12 months later. All eight CHAs achieved competency and provided services in their village clinics with telephone support from an experienced clinician. The post-training year Pap test rate of women who were overdue for a Pap test was 0.44 in the villages with trained CHAs; the rate among the women in the comparison villages was 0.32 (p = .079).
Although Serratia marcescens is a well-known nosocomial pathogen, investigation of its hospital ecology has been limited by the lack of available typing techniques. During an investigation of the occurrence of this organism in a neonatal intensive care unit, we evaluated a number of such techniques. Using a selective medium, we conducted prospective surveillance of neonatal rectal colonization and environmental contamination with S. marcescens. In 8 months of surveillance, 5.1% (20 of 394) of the infants admitted to the unit became colonized. Most sink surfaces and drains were also culture positive. Differences between isolates could not be detected in biotypes from a commercial identification system (MicroScan) or by antibiograms, total protein fingerprints, or plasmid profiles. Serogrouping and genomic DNA restriction endonuclease analysis revealed the presence of six strains that colonized infants and a similar number of environmental strains. These two methods were concordant, with the exception that genomic DNA analysis demonstrated lack of relatedness between some strains within the same serogroup. DNA restriction endonuclease analysis was practical and reliable. The differences this method detected between environmental and neonatal strains provided strong evidence that the environment was not an important reservoir for S. marcescens in our neonatal intensive care unit.
The BACTEC PLUS 26 (NR26) (Becton Dickinson, Towson, Md.) high-volume blood culture bottle replaced the less expensive smaller-volume NR6A bottle in our hospital. An audit carried out several months after their introduction revealed that only 17.5% of the NR26 bottles received the required blood volume. Several audits and educational programs were required in order to achieve a compliance rate of > 60%.
