Surgical site infection prevalence and associated factors in Hawassa University comprehensive specialized hospital, southern Ethiopia.
Abstract Background Surgical site infections (SSIs) continue the main problem in health care facilities, causing the prolonged length of stay, considerable morbidity, mortality, and the extra cost to patients after surgery. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of SSIs and explore its associated factors among surgical patients at Hawassa university comprehensive specialized hospital, southern Ethiopia.Methods A hospital-based cross-sectional study design was conducted among post-operative patients on a sample of 281 who were admitted and have had surgery from 1 March – 1 April 2019. Purposive sampling technique and the structured questioner were selected to gather data from the patient's medical record, interview, and observation. EPI Info 3.5.4 was a data entry software and SPSS version 20.0 was selected for analysis. Associations among variables were assessed by binary logistic regression.Result A total of 281 patients have participated and the mean age was 30.3 (±18.9) years. The prevalence of SSIs was (24.6%) (95% CI 19.6 – 29.69). Age less than 15 years AOR = 0.131 (95% CI 0.020, 0.087), having clean surgical wound AOR = 0.006 (95% CI 0.002, 0.024) were significant protective associated factors to SSIs while having open surgical wound AOR =5.189 (95% CI 1.511, 17.821) and malnutrition AOR =29.351 (95% CI 5.711, 150.851) were significant risk associated factors to SSIs.Conclusion The prevalence of SSIs was bigger than the worldwide range between (1.2%) and (5.2%) even higher compared to reports from several developing countries. This needs exceptional attention to reduce the odds of surgical site infection by standardizing patient care and controlling of comorbidities.