Incidence and risk factors of surgical wound infection in children: a prospective study.
OBJECTIVE
to establish the incidence and risk factors of surgical site infection (SSI) in children operated in the Department of Paediatric Surgery of the Clinic of Surgery of Tartu University Hospital.


METHODS
the data of wound healing were obtained for 589 children operated between 15 March 2003 and 31 March 2005. The operations were divided into general surgical (451), orthopaedic (70) and urological (68). The surgical wounds were classified as clean (442), clean-contaminated (96), contaminated (36) and dirty-infected (15). Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed to identify risk factors.


RESULTS
There were 7 SSI cases, overall rate being 1.2%. Superficial wound infection occurred in 5 cases and deep wound infection occurred in 2 cases. There was no organ/space infection. SSI was significantly more frequent in the case of contaminated and dirty-infected compared with clean or clean-contaminated operations, 7.8% and 0.6%, respectively (p = 0.0008). Wound infection endangered more children who had operation related complications compared with non-complicated cases, 11.1% and 0.4%, respectively (p < 0.0001).
Tartu University Department of Surgery, Tartu, Estonia. karin.varik@kliinikum.ee
K
K
Varik
U
U
Kirsimägi
E A
EA
Värimäe
M
M
Eller
R
R
Lõivukene
V
V
Kübarsepp
D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D007223:Infant; D008297:Male; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D011183:Postoperative Complications / Q000453:epidemiology; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D013530:Surgical Wound Infection / Q000453:epidemiology*