Nosocomial Infections

The term nosocomial infection or hospital-acquired infection is applied to any clinical infection that was neither present nor was in its incubation period when the patient entered the hospital. Nosocomial infections may also make their appearance after discharge from the hospital, if the patient was in the incubation period at the time of discharge. Nosocomial infections, even in this modern era of antibiotics, continue to remain an important and formidable consequence of hospitalization. It has been estimated that about 3.5% of patients leave the hospital after having acquired infections. Such infections include fungal and bacterial infections and are aggravated by the reduced resistance of individual patients. The sites of nosocomial infection are not specific. Infections can occur at any site like urinary tract, surgical site, respiratory tract, blood stream, skin, gastrointestinal tract, and even central nervous system.