Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed

Surgical site infection (SSI) continues to be a burden on systems that deliver healthcare and on patients who suffer morbidity, and mortality, associated with this complication of medical intervention. Surveillance of SSI is often an integral part of organizational infection prevention and control a...

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Main Authors: Leaper, David, Tanner, Judith, Kiernan, Martin
Format: Article
Published: Elsevier 2013
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Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/50781/
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author Leaper, David
Tanner, Judith
Kiernan, Martin
author_facet Leaper, David
Tanner, Judith
Kiernan, Martin
author_sort Leaper, David
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description Surgical site infection (SSI) continues to be a burden on systems that deliver healthcare and on patients who suffer morbidity, and mortality, associated with this complication of medical intervention. Surveillance of SSI is often an integral part of organizational infection prevention and control activities, but unless post-discharge surveillance is carried out in a robust manner the data may be inaccurate and misleading. Coupled with a lack of robust application of definitions, variations in methods of case-finding and incomplete follow-up, the results may lead to a false sense of security or conversely cause unnecessary anxieties. Data from national surveillance schemes that purport to be suitable for benchmarking are often at odds with published rates from well-designed studies and the reasons for this should be examined. If benchmarking is truly desirable and if clinicians are to have confidence in the outputs, surveillance schemes should ensure that participating organizations adopt a consistent approach to definitions, case-finding methodologies following discharge, and to robust follow-up, to ensure that every opportunity is taken to maximize the return rate and enhance data validity.
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spelling nottingham-507812020-05-04T16:35:25Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/50781/ Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed Leaper, David Tanner, Judith Kiernan, Martin Surgical site infection (SSI) continues to be a burden on systems that deliver healthcare and on patients who suffer morbidity, and mortality, associated with this complication of medical intervention. Surveillance of SSI is often an integral part of organizational infection prevention and control activities, but unless post-discharge surveillance is carried out in a robust manner the data may be inaccurate and misleading. Coupled with a lack of robust application of definitions, variations in methods of case-finding and incomplete follow-up, the results may lead to a false sense of security or conversely cause unnecessary anxieties. Data from national surveillance schemes that purport to be suitable for benchmarking are often at odds with published rates from well-designed studies and the reasons for this should be examined. If benchmarking is truly desirable and if clinicians are to have confidence in the outputs, surveillance schemes should ensure that participating organizations adopt a consistent approach to definitions, case-finding methodologies following discharge, and to robust follow-up, to ensure that every opportunity is taken to maximize the return rate and enhance data validity. Elsevier 2013-01-17 Article PeerReviewed Leaper, David, Tanner, Judith and Kiernan, Martin (2013) Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed. Journal of Hospital Infection, 83 (2). pp. 83-86. ISSN 1532-2939 Post-discharge surveillance Surgical site infection http://www.journalofhospitalinfection.com/article/S0195-6701(12)00408-2/abstract doi:10.1016/j.jhin.2012.11.013 doi:10.1016/j.jhin.2012.11.013
spellingShingle Post-discharge surveillance
Surgical site infection
Leaper, David
Tanner, Judith
Kiernan, Martin
Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed
title Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed
title_full Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed
title_fullStr Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed
title_full_unstemmed Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed
title_short Surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed
title_sort surveillance of surgical site infection: more accurate definitions and more intensive recordings needed
topic Post-discharge surveillance
Surgical site infection
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/50781/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/50781/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/50781/