Charley Ann Nix, Mary Joyce B Wingler, Kayla R Stover, Katie E Barber, Tulip A Jhaveri, David A Cretella
This study evaluated the effectiveness of universal decolonization in intensive care units to decrease hospital-acquired Staphylococcus aureus infections (HA-SAI). HA-SAI (primary endpoint) decreased from 158 patients to 80 patients, infections per 1000 patient days decreased from 5.36 to 2.47, and in-hospital mortality was significantly lower in the post-group (32% vs 16%; p = 0.008). Universal decolonization is a successful way to decrease HA-SAI and reduce in-hospital all-cause mortality amongst adult ICU patients.