title: Where should one search when confronted with outbreaks of nosocomial infection?
abstract: The outbreak database (http://www.outbreak-database.com), containing 1561 records of nosocomial outbreaks published in the medical literature in a systematic format, was used to identify the most frequent outbreak sources for the entire database as well as for specific outbreak pathogens. Overall, in 37.1%, no source was identified. The main sources identified were index patients (40.3%), followed by equipment and devices (21.1%), environment (19.8%), and personnel (15.8%).
authors.affiliation: Institute for Medical Microbiology and Hospital Epidemiology, Medical School Hannover, Hannover, Germany.
authors.forename: Petra
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Gastmeier
authors.forename: Sabine
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Stamm-Balderjahn
authors.forename: Sonja
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hansen
authors.forename: Irina
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Zuschneid
authors.forename: Dorit
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Sohr
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Behnke
authors.forename: Ralf-Peter
authors.initials: RP
authors.lastname: Vonberg
authors.forename: Henning
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Rüden
mesh_terms: D003428:Cross Infection / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000382:microbiology / Q000517:prevention & control; D016206:Databases, Bibliographic; D004196:Disease Outbreaks / Q000517:prevention & control / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D017053:Infection Control / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D012307:Risk Factors