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- Title
Outcomes of patients hospitalized with community-acquired, health care-associated, and hospital-acquired pneumonia.
- Authors
Venditti M; Falcone M; Corrao S; Licata G; Serra P; Study Group of the Italian Society of Internal Medicine; Venditti, Mario; Falcone, Marco; Corrao, Salvatore; Licata, Giuseppe; Serra, Pietro
- Abstract
<bold>Background: </bold>Traditionally, pneumonia has been classified as either community- or hospital-acquired. Although only limited data are available, health care-associated pneumonia has been recently proposed as a new category of respiratory infection. "Health care-associated pneumonia" refers to pneumonia in patients who have recently been hospitalized, had hemodialysis, or received intravenous chemotherapy or reside in a nursing home or long-term care facility.<bold>Objective: </bold>To ascertain the epidemiology and outcome of community-acquired, health care-associated, and hospital-acquired pneumonia in adults hospitalized in internal medicine wards.<bold>Design: </bold>Multicenter, prospective observational study.<bold>Setting: </bold>55 hospitals in Italy comprising 1941 beds.<bold>Patients: </bold>362 patients hospitalized with pneumonia during two 1-week surveillance periods.<bold>Measurements: </bold>Cases of radiologically and clinically assessed pneumonia were classified as community-acquired, health care-associated, or hospital-acquired and rates were compared.<bold>Results: </bold>Of the 362 patients, 61.6% had community-acquired pneumonia, 24.9% had health care-associated pneumonia, and 13.5% had hospital-acquired pneumonia. Patients with health care-associated pneumonia had higher mean Sequential Organ Failure Assessment scores than did those with community-acquired pneumonia (3.0 vs. 2.0), were more frequently malnourished (11.1% vs. 4.5%, and had more frequent bilateral (34.4% vs. 19.7%) and multilobar (27.8% vs. 21.5%) involvement on a chest radiograph. Patients with health care-associated pneumonia also had higher fatality rates (17.8% [CI, 10.6% to 24.9%] vs. 6.7% [CI, 2.9% to 10.5%]) and longer mean hospital stay (18.7 days [CI, 15.9 to 21.5 days] vs. 14.7 days [CI, 13.4 to 15.9 days]). Logistic regression analysis revealed that depression of consciousness (odds ratio [OR], 3.2 [CI, 1.06 to 9.8]), leukopenia (OR, 6.2 [CI, 1.01 to 37.6]), and receipt of empirical antibiotic therapy not recommended by international guidelines (OR, 6.4 [CI, 2.3 to 17.6]) were independently associated with increased intrahospital mortality.<bold>Limitations: </bold>The number of patients with health care-associated pneumonia was relatively small. Microbiological investigations were not always homogeneous. The study included only patients with pneumonia that required hospitalization; results may not apply to patients treated as outpatients.<bold>Conclusion: </bold>Health care-associated pneumonia should be considered a distinct subset of pneumonia associated with more severe disease, longer hospital stay, and higher mortality rates. Physicians should differentiate between patients with health care-associated pneumonia and those with community-acquired pneumonia and provide more appropriate initial antibiotic therapy.
- Publication
Annals of Internal Medicine, 2009, Vol 150, Issue 1, p19
- ISSN
0003-4819
- Publication type
journal article
- DOI
10.7326/0003-4819-150-1-200901060-00005