Hospital Outreach Unit and Healthcare Associated Infections
Mission:
To enhance emerging infectious disease preparedness and response efforts and improve
hospital disease reporting by hospitals in Los Angeles County through strengthened communications,
collaborations, and consolidation of resources.
This unit assists hospitals with outbreak investigations, consults on infection control
issues, and enhances communication with hospitals by interacting with infection control
practitioners, emergency departments and laboratories.
In 2005, the most common cause of reported hospital outbreaks continued to be scabies. This
was followed in number by outbreaks of Clostridium difficile enteritis and methicillin-resistant
Staphylococcus areaus (MRSA) infections. In 2005, two high profile outbreaks occurred. The
first, in January, was an outbreak of Serratia marcescens associated with cardio-thoracic
surgery. A joint CDC investigation revealed the most likely source of infection as contaminated
magnesium sulfate solution. The other outbreak involved MRSA infection and was associated with
a hospital burn unit. Upon CDC laboratory analysis and review of the MRSA PFGE pattern, it was
determined that the outbreak isolate was a unique Brazilian clone never before seen in LAC and
rarely seen in the US. This Brazilian clone is the most common type of MRSA in parts of South
America and has been reported in Hungary and Portugal, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and the Czech
Republic—but aside from the LAC event, only one other report of this strain causing an outbreak
exists in the US. More detailed summaries of these investigations can be found in the Special
Reports 2005 section.
In 2005, the most common outbreaks in skilled nursing and other sub-acute health facilities
were due to scabies and gastroenteritis, similar to previous years. From 2004-2005, LAC
experienced a dramatic increase in the number of reported scabies outbreaks in both acute care
hospitals and skilled nursing facilities. The overall number of reported healthcare outbreaks
has been steadily increasing over the last five years. Additional review of hospital outbreaks
and investigations are available in ACDC’s 2005 Morbidity Report. The Hospital Outreach Unit,
a core feature of ACDC’s continued outreach to the healthcare community, continues to enhance
communication and outbreak reporting between health facilities and Public Health.
Areas of Interest
