McCausland Hospital

"Providers of Care with Compassion & Concern"

Clostridium difficile (C.difficile)

The McCausland Hospital takes your care and your safety very seriously, and we are committed to transparency.  On a monthly basis, beginning in September 2008, we will be reporting our C.difficle infection rates on our website.

If you have any questions about the information below or about our hospital's infection prevention and control program, please contact Teresa Roberts at 825-3273, ext 129.

Current C. Difficile Rates for McCausland Hospital

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C.difficile Rate:

The C.difficile infection rate is calculated as a rate per 1,000 patient days.

The "total patient days" represents the sum of the number of days during which services were provided to all inpatients during the given time period.

The rate is calculated as follows:

Number of new hospital acquired cases of C.diff in our facility     X   1000
Total number of patient days (for one month)

For Smaller Facilities:

C.difficile rates may vary from month to month:  the smaller the facility, the greater the rates will vary - this is because a change in even one case in a small facility will cause the rate to go up or down considerably.

Information for Patients and Families

Measuring Clostridium difficile (C.difficile) rates
McCausland Hospital posts its infection rates online on a monthly basis.  On this website, you can find information about hospital-acquired infection rates for C.difficile.

What are hospital-acquired infections?
Sometimes when patients are admitted to the hospital, they can get infections.  These are called hospital-acquired infections.  In the case of C.difficile, this may mean that symptoms began 72 hours after admission to the hospital; or that the infection was present at the time of admission but was related to a previous admission to that hospital within the last four weeks.

What is C.difficile?
C.difficile (Clostridium difficile) is a bacteria.  C.difficile can be part of the normal bacteria in the large intestine and is one of the many bacteria that can be found in stool ( a bowel movement ).

A C.difficile infection occurs when other good bacteria in the bowel are eliminated or decreased allowing the C.difficle bacteria to grow and produce toxin.  The toxin produced can damage the bowel and cause diarrhea.  C.difficile is one example of a hospital-acquired infection and is one of the most common infections found in hospitals and long-term care facilities.  C.difficile has been a known cause ofhealth care associated diarrhea for about 30 years.

Who is at risk for C.difficle?
Healthy people are not usually susceptible to C.difficile.  Seniors, and people who have other illnesses or conditions being treated with antibiotics and certain other stomach medications, are at greater risk of an infection from C.difficile.

What are the symptoms of C.difficile?
The usual symptoms are mild but can be severe.  Main symptoms are watery diarrhea, fever, abdominal pain/tenderness.  In some cases there may not be diarrhea.  Blood may or may not be present in the stools.

How does C. difficile spread?
When a person has C. difficile, the germs in the stool can soil surfaces such as toilets, handles, bedpans, or commode chairs.  When touching these items, your hands can become soiled.  If you then touch your mouth, you can swallow the germ.  Your soiled hands can spread germs that can survive for a long time on other surfaces if not properly cleaned.

The spread of C. difficile occurs due to inadequate hand hygiene and environmental cleaning; therefore, proper control is acheived through consistent hand hygiene and thorough cleaning of the patient environment.  Good hand hygiene, i.e. washing hands thoroughly and often, is the single-most effective way to prevent the spread of infectious diseases like C. difficile.