CAUTIs from External Catheters Need Further Study, Better Reporting

External catheters, such as condom catheters, account for a large portion of catheter-associated bacteriuria and should not be overlooked when conducting surveillance for catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs), concludes a study published in the August 2013 issue of Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology.

The study, which included 7,866 inpatients in two tertiary care U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs hospitals in Texas from July 2010 to June 2011, found that external catheters contributed to 376 (37.3%) of the 1,009 catheter-associated positive urine cultures identified. Although indwelling catheters still accounted for the most cases of catheter-associated bacteriuria, condom...