ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT Background Candidemia is the most frequent invasive fungal disease in hospitalized patients, and is associated with high mortality rates. The main objective of this study was to evaluate changes in the epidemiology of candidemia at a tertiary care hospital in a 21-year period. Methods We evaluated all episodes of candidemia diagnosed between 1996 and 2016 at a University-affiliated tertiary care hospital in Brazil. We arbitrarily divided the study period in 3: 1996-2002 (period 1), 2003-2009 (period 2) and 2010-2016 (period 3). Incidence rates were calculated using hospital admissions as denominator. Results We observed 331 episodes of candidemia. The incidence was 1.30 episodes per 1000 admissions, with no significant change over time. Candida albicans (37.5%), C. tropicalis (28.1%), C. parapsilosis (18.4%) and C. glabrata (6.9%) were the most frequent species. The proportion of patients receiving treatment increased (65.5%, 79.4% and 74.7% in periods 1, 2 and 3, respectively, p= 0.04), and the median time from candidemia to treatment initiation decreased from 4 days in period 1 (range 0-32 days) to 2 days in period 2 (range 0-33 days) and 2 days in period 3 (range 0-14 days, p< 0.001). We observed a significant decrease in the use of deoxycholate amphotericin B (47.4%, 14.8% and 11.9%), and an increase in the use of echinocandins (0%, 2.8% and 49.1%; p< 0.001). The APACHE II score increased over time (median 16, 17.5, and 22, p< 0.001). The overall 30-day mortality was 58.9%, and did not change significantly over the study period. Conclusions There was an improvement in patient care, with an increase in the proportion of patients receiving treatment and a decrease in the time to treatment initiation, but no improvement in the outcome, possibly because the proportion of sicker patients increased over time.