Reductions in Clostridium difficile Infection (CDI) Rates Using Real-Time Automated Clinical Criteria Verification to Enforce Appropriate Testing

Kathleen A Quan; Jennifer Yim; Doug Merrill; Usme Khusbu; Keith Madey; Linda Dickey; Amish A Dangodara; Scott E Rudkin; Margaret O'Brien; Daniel Thompson; Nimisha Parekh; C Gregory Albers; William C Wilson; Lauri Thrupp; Cassiana E Bittencourt; Susan S Huang; Shruti K Gohil

doi:10.1017/ice.2018.32

Reductions in Clostridium difficile Infection (CDI) Rates Using Real-Time Automated Clinical Criteria Verification to Enforce Appropriate Testing

Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol. 2018 May;39(5):625-627. doi: 10.1017/ice.2018.32. Epub 2018 Mar 19.

Authors

Kathleen A Quan¹, Jennifer Yim¹, Doug Merrill², Usme Khusbu¹, Keith Madey¹, Linda Dickey¹, Amish A Dangodara³, Scott E Rudkin⁴, Margaret O'Brien⁵, Daniel Thompson⁵, Nimisha Parekh³, C Gregory Albers³, William C Wilson³, Lauri Thrupp¹, Cassiana E Bittencourt⁶, Susan S Huang¹, Shruti K Gohil¹

Affiliations

¹ 1Epidemiology and Infection Prevention,University of California Irvine Health,Orange,California.
² 3Renown Health,Reno School of Medicine,University of Nevada,Reno,Nevada.
³ 4Department of Medicine,School of Medicine,University of California Irvine,Irvine,California.
⁴ 5Department of Emergency Medicine,School of Medicine,University of California Irvine,Irvine,California.
⁵ 6Health Affairs Information Services,School of Medicine,University of California Irvine,Irvine,California.
⁶ 10Department of Pathology,School of Medicine,University of California Irvine,Irvine,California.

Abstract

C. difficile PCR testing identifies both colonized and infected patients, making it critical to only test patients that meet clinical criteria for C. difficile infection (CDI). We implemented an automated order-entry protocol that reduced inappropriate testing by 64% and hospital-onset (HO) CDI Standardized Infection Ratio (SIR) from 1.62 to 0.82.

Publication types

Comparative Study

MeSH terms

Academic Medical Centers
Clostridioides difficile / isolation & purification*
Clostridium Infections / diagnosis*
Clostridium Infections / epidemiology
Cohort Studies
Decision Support Systems, Clinical
Diagnostic Tests, Routine / statistics & numerical data*
Diarrhea
Humans
Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction

Abstract

Publication types

MeSH terms

Grants and funding