A risk for new infection in digestive surgery

AFP

Tuesday, 13 February, 2018 18:48

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Tuesday, 13 February, 2018 18:48

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PARIS | More than one operation of digestive surgery about nine in the world leads to an infection, according to a study published Wednesday, which points to gaps in the rational use of antibiotics.

This study, published in the Lancet Infectious Diseases, and which covers the data of 2 500 practitioners and researchers in 66 countries, shows that 12.3% of the operated patients had suffered an infection in the 30 days following.

The risk is two times more important in low-income countries.

The problem is not the lack of antibiotics, very widely prescribed, and even almost always in the less-wealthy countries. It is rather in excess.

“In a fifth of cases the micro-organism was resistant to the antibiotics administered before the operation, and this rose to one in three in low-income countries”, stressed in a press release Ewen Harrison, of the university of Edinburgh, Great Britain.

Half (49%) of these 12 500 operations, carried out between January and July 2016, were made in an emergency. The most frequent consisted of removing the gall bladder (35%) and appendix (33%).

The overall operations resulted in the death in 1.9% of cases. If it was the organ operated on who was infected, the risk of death was more than tripled (4.7% vs. 1.5 percent).

“Even if the researchers do not recommend a change in practice in favour of antimicrobial treatment as soon as, the abuse of antibiotics in countries with low and middle income, especially in the postoperative phase, is associated with an increase of antimicrobial resistance,” commented the journal in an editorial.