Seventh C. difficile patient dies at Guelph General

A patient who had C. difficile and other medical issues died this week at Guelph General Hospital.

That brings to seven the number of C. difficile patients who have died at the hospital of since early May. A total of 18 patients have tested positive for hospital-acquired C. difficile during that period.

The hospital officially declared an outbreak on July 5.

The complicating factor is that while provincial health authorities require hospitals to report hospital-acquired cases, C. difficile also occurs naturally in an estimated three to five per cent of the public.

That’s the case with the latest patient, who was admitted Monday and died Wednesday, the hospital reported Friday.

Hospital president and chief executive Richard Ernst said the patient had medical conditions that included C. difficile. The patient, who the hospital isn’t divulging personal information about because of privacy issues, “had (C. difficile) when they came but was not admitted for this,” he said.

The patient, in other words, was admitted for other medical reasons, though because of the C. difficile was placed in isolation.

All that can be said for sure is that the individual’s C. difficile “may have been a contributing factor,” Ernst said, adding this is similar to the other fatalities.

Those fatalities typically have been among the frail elderly.

Almost a dozen southern Ontario hospitals have struggled with elevated hospital-acquired C. difficile levels this summer, resulting in about two dozen deaths to date.

Guelph General usually sees about one or two cases of hospital-acquired C. difficile in any given month, but became concerned when levels rose beginning in May. It reported seven cases that month, five in June and an equal number in July.

“It’s not an isolated situation for someone to come to hospital with C. difficile,” Ernst continued.

He said that in any given year, the hospital sees roughly as many people with community-acquired C. difficile as patients who acquire it while in hospital, which he estimated at several dozen.

As of Friday afternoon, there were four patients at Guelph General with C. difficile: three with community-acquired cases and one contracted while in hospital.

While a small portion of the general public are asymptomatic carriers (meaning they have no symptoms), they can still spread the disease to others, particularly those with compromised health.

Originating in feces, C. difficile is spread directly or indirectly through contact with contaminated surfaces such as hands and counter tops, which is why Guelph General and other hospitals are urging visitors to ensure their hands are sanitized with available cleansers when they enter and exit facilities.

They’ve also stepped up cleaning and disinfecting their hospitals in recent months.

C. difficile is difficult to eradicate. It is reproduced through hardy spores resistant to standard disinfectants. There’s some evidence some strains are increasingly resistant to antibiotics, or can flourish when such antibiotics kill benign bacteria in a person’s gastrointestinal tract.