McNeil, Thomas, Zhang, Frank, Moffatt, Samuel, Emeto, Theophilus I., and Tucker, Emily (2024) Nosocomial COVID‐19 infection in the era of vaccination and antiviral therapy. Internal Medicine Journal, 54 (3). pp. 374-381.

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Abstract

Background and Aims: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination and antiviral therapies have altered the course of the COVID-19 pandemic through mitigating severe illness and death. However, immunocompromised, elderly and multimorbid patients remain at risk of poor outcomes and are overrepresented in hospital populations. The aim of this study was to describe the characteristics and outcomes of patients with nosocomial COVID-19 infection.

Methods: This was a retrospective, observational study of patients who acquired COVID-19 after 7 days of hospital admission within the Southern Adelaide Local Health Network (SALHN) in South Australia between 1 June 2022 and 30 November 2022. Data were ascertained from the electronic medical record and the South Australian registry of births, deaths and marriages.

Results: Of 1084 COVID-19 inpatient cases managed in SALHN, 295 (27%) were nosocomial, with 215 included in the study. The median age of patients was 80 years (interquartile range [IQR], 68–88 years), the median Charlson Comorbidity Index score was 5 (IQR, 4–7) and 6% were immunocompromised. Most nosocomial COVID-19 infections were of mild severity (81%). The 30-day all-cause mortality rate following COVID-19 infection was 6%, and, in most cases, a cause of death other than COVID-19 was recorded on the death certificate.

Conclusion: The majority of cases of nosocomial COVID-19 infection were mild, with a lower mortality rate than in earlier studies. This finding is likely attributable to immunity through vaccination and prior infection, early antiviral therapy and attenuated severity of the Omicron variant. The high proportion of nosocomial infections supports ongoing infection control measures.

Item ID:	81267
Item Type:	Article (Research - C1)
ISSN:	1445-5994
Copyright Information:	© 2023 The Authors. Internal Medicine Journal published by John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd on behalf of Royal Australasian College of Physicians. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.
Date Deposited:	30 Nov 2023 02:31
FoR Codes:	49 MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES > 4905 Statistics > 490502 Biostatistics @ 30% 32 BIOMEDICAL AND CLINICAL SCIENCES > 3202 Clinical sciences > 320211 Infectious diseases @ 50% 42 HEALTH SCIENCES > 4202 Epidemiology > 420202 Disease surveillance @ 20%
SEO Codes:	20 HEALTH > 2001 Clinical health > 200104 Prevention of human diseases and conditions @ 50% 20 HEALTH > 2004 Public health (excl. specific population health) > 200404 Disease distribution and transmission (incl. surveillance and response) @ 50%
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