Patients lodged in multi-bed hospital rooms stand a higher risk, up to nine times, of contracting Staphylococcus aureus in comparison to those in single-bed rooms. These findings were presented at a recent IDWeek. Although the elevated infection risk in multi-patient rooms is generally acknowledged within the health sector, there’s been a palpable lack of supportive data, says Sarah E. Hochman, an esteemed epidemiologist and the infectious diseases section chief at Tisch Hospital, New York.
At NYU Langone Health, a highly productive active surveillance initiative for S. aureus targets asymptomatic colonized patients for decolonization to minimize their potential risk of hospital-borne invasive infections. To offer an analytical perspective, S. aureus strains undergo whole genome sequencing to identify closely related strains, indicative of a recent transmission between patients. Hochman noticed the possibility of establishing a comparison model between single and multi-bedded hospital rooms to ascertain pathogen transmission using S. aureus as the standard.
The study employed data gathered from two hospitals from an urban health system, which saw the collection and whole genome sequencing of surveillance and clinical isolates from October 2022 to December 2023. Strains, closely related and linked based on the data concerning patient locations, were labeled as ‘high-probability transmissions’. The research contrasted S. aureus transmission rates among single, two-bed, and four-bed rooms, with an impressive database of over 5,000 isolates from around 4,000 patients that underwent whole genome sequencing.
The study’s results revealed the lowest transmission risk in single-bed rooms, an increase in two-bed rooms, and an almost ninefold escalation in four-bed rooms. This discovery held steady across varying lengths of hospital stays and maintained irrespective of age, sex, or comorbidity differences among patients. In conclusion, patients in multi-bedded rooms remain more vulnerable to S. aureus transmission when juxtaposed with those in single or two-bedded rooms. As per Hochman, hospitals should concentrate infection prevention efforts in multi-bedded rooms for enhanced intervention strategies to curb the risk of pathogen transmission.