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What do infectious diseases physicians do? a 2-week snapshot of inpatient consultative activities across Australia, New Zealand and Singapore

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journal contribution
posted on 2024-10-19, 23:52 authored by PR Ingram, Ronan J Murray, Allen C Cheng, CC Blyth, Tony Walls, DA Fisher, Josh S Davis, Iain Abbott, Rupa Kanapathipillai, Victoria Madigan, Duncan McLellan, Simon Briggs, Claire King, James Hurley, Lyn Li Lim, Karina Kennedy, Heather Wilson, Thomas Evans, Michael Maze, Alan Pithie, Lauren Chong, Grace Leung, Sarah McCann, Lai yang Lee, Jill Wolfgang, Thomas Day, Gustinna De Silva, Marianne Martinello, Thomas Gliddon, Moira Wilson, Eugene AthanEugene Athan, James Pollard, Patrick Harris, Rajesh Pachchigar, Michael Wehrhahn, Paul Moriarty, David Holland, Andrew Langlands, Stephen McBride, Moayid Sherif, Kate Lim, Keat Choong, Andrew Henderson, David Sowden, Richard Everts, Manesh Manon, Archana Sud, Kerry Read, Rudyard Yap, Evan Bursle, Robert Gluer, David Siebert, Gail Cross, Joshua Francis, Cameron Booth, Simon Dalton, Eng Lee Ooi, Desmond Chih, John Dyer, Julia Clarke, Keith Grimwood, Amanda Gwee, Robert Commons, Suman Majumdar, Sanchia Warren, David Manners, Edward Raby, Devi Radhakrishnan, Caitlin Keighley, Ravindra Dotel, David Paterson, Emma Best, Ar Kar Aung, Tim Paterson, Marilyn Hassell, Jim Newcombe, Ryan Llorin, David Lye, Massimo Giola, Haur Sen Yew, James Taylor, Jon Iredell, Simon Pollett, Lokesh Garg, Zoe Jennings, Amit Kapur, Spiros Miyakis, Dhananjay Parshuramkar, Kyaw Myo Thu, Kavita Rasiah, Narin Bak, Sharon Chen, Louise Cooley, David Gordon, Ben Howden, Emma McBryde, David Murdoch, Anton Peleg, Anna Ralph, Owen Robinson, Monica Slavin, Tania Sorrell, Steve Tong, Ian Woolley
The practice of an infectious diseases (ID) physician is evolving. A contemporary understanding of the frequency and variety of patients and syndromes seen by ID services has implications for training, service development and setting research priorities. We performed a 2-week prospective survey of formal ID physician activities related to direct inpatient care, encompassing 53 hospitals throughout Australia, New Zealand and Singapore, and documented 1722 inpatient interactions. Infections involving the skin and soft tissue, respiratory tract and bone/joints together accounted for 49% of all consultations. Suspected/confirmed pathogens were primarily bacterial (60%), rather than viral (6%), fungal (4%), mycobacterial (2%) or parasitic (1%). Staphylococcus aureus was implicated in 409 (24%) episodes, approximately four times more frequently than the next most common pathogen. The frequency of healthcare-related infections (35%), immunosuppression (21%), diabetes mellitus (19%), prosthesis-related infections (13%), multiresistant pathogens (13%) and non-infectious diagnoses (9%) was high, although consultation characteristics varied between geographical settings and hospital types. Our study highlights the diversity of inpatient-related ID activities and should direct future teaching and research. ID physicians' ability to offer beneficial consultative advice requires broad understanding of, and ability to interact with, a wide range of referring specialities.

History

Journal

Clinical microbiology and infection

Volume

20

Pagination

O737-O744

Location

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Open access

  • Yes

eISSN

1469-0691

Language

eng

Publication classification

C Journal article, C1.1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Copyright notice

2014, The Authors

Issue

10

Publisher

Elsevier