Publication Type : Journal Article
Publisher : Elsevier BV
Source : Heliyon
Url : https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2026.e44623
Keywords : COVID, Hospital acquired infection, Antimicrobial resistance
Campus : Faridabad
School : School of Medicine
Year : 2026
Abstract : Objectives Blood stream infections (BSIs) are potentially fatal healthcare associated infections (HAIs). The COVID pandemic had a huge impact on hospital processes and health care outcomes. We studied the impact of COVID pandemic on the prevalence of ICU acquired BSIs in our established Indian HAI surveillance network. Material and methods This study included adult patients from ICUs in AIIMS HAI network that conducted BSI surveillance in COVID and non-COVID ICUs during and before the pandemic periods. Of the 40 hospitals in the network, ICUs from 16 hospitals conducted HAI surveillance in COVID ICUs and were included for the purposes of this study. Hospitals identified BSI and reported clinical and microbiological data to the network as per established and previously published protocols. Results A total of 1,863 events of BSI were identified during pre-pandemic and 2,571 events during pandemic period. During the pandemic, 557 (21.6%) were reported from COVID ICUs. The BSI rate during the pandemic was 8.9/1,000 patient days, and during pre-pandemic 5.4/1,000 patient days (P < 0.01). The central line associated BSI (CLABSI) rates increased from 9.2/1,000 central line days during the pre-pandemic period to 11.3/1,000 central line days during pandemic. Conclusion An increase in BSIs during the COVID pandemic was observed, which may be attributed to increased susceptibility of the patients or suboptimal infection control practices in COVID ICUs.
Cite this Research Publication : Mamta Puraswani, Arpan Kumar Thakur, Rasna Parveen, Sharad Srivastav, Aparna Ningombam, Arunaloke Chakrabarti, Pallab Ray, Manisha Biswal, Balaji Veeraraghavan, Camilla Rodrigues, Vijaya Lakshmi Nag, Vibhor Tak, Vimala Venkatesh, Chiranjay Mukhopadhyay, Vijayshri Deotale, Kanne Padmaja, Chand Wattal, Sanjay Bhattacharya, Tadepalli Karuna, Bijayini Behera, Sanjeev K. Singh, Raja Ray, Bashir Ahmad Fomda, Padma Das, Nandini Sethuraman, Jyoti Iravane, Amber Prasad, Puneet Kumar Gupta, Shashank Purwar, Sagar Khadanga, Ashoka Mahapatra, Vinay Kumar Hallur, Vidhi Jain, Pradeep Bhatia, Kuldeep Singh, Daisy Khera, Neeraj Gupta, Ujjwala Gaikwad, Anudita Bhargava, Balram Ji Omar, Pratima Gupta, Prasan Kumar Panda, Ankit Agarwal, Prakhar Sharma, Gaurav Jain, M.A. Thirunarayan, Yamunadevi V Ramanathan, Aparna Sonowal, Joy Sarojini Michael, Hema Paul, Juliah Chelliah, Anjali Shetty, Hirak Jyoti Raj, Vandana K E, Muralidhar Varma, Sheetal Verma, Zia Arshad, Ruchita Lohiya, Neeraj Goel, Sehrish Baqal, Soumyadip Chatterji, Gaurav Goel, Satyam Mukherjee, Khuraijam Ranjana Devi, L. Chaoba Singh, Sanjeev Lalwani, Kapil Devi Soni, Sushma Sagar, Richa Aggrawal, Vijay Sharma, Subodh Kumar, Kamran Farooque, Kamini Walia, Purva Mathur, Impact of COVID-19 on bloodstream infections in ICUs: Report from Indian HAI surveillance network, Heliyon, Elsevier BV, 2026, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2026.e44623
