RESUMEN
The aim of this work was to study the prevalence of bacterial infections in hospitalized patients with liver cirrhosis and to compare clinical, bacteriological and evolution features of patients with (group 1) and without bacterial infection (group 2). 132 hospitalized patients with liver cirrhosis were prospectively studied and 61 episodes of bacterial infections were diagnosed in 52 (27 spontaneous bacterial peritonitis (44.3 per cent) 16 urinary tract infections (26.2 per cent), 10 pneumonias (16.4 per cent), 3 spontaneous bacteremias (4.9 per cent) and 5 miscellaneous infections (8.2 per cent)). 26 per cent of infections were nosocomial. Child-Pugh score was 12 ñ 2 in group 1 vs 10 ñ 2 in group 2 (p=0.047). 65 per cent of identified microorganisms were gram negative and 61.5 per cent of these were E. coli. Hospital mortality of group 1 was 29 per cent and that of group 2 was 9 per cent (p=0.002). It is concluded that there is a high prevalence of bacterial infections in hospitalized cirrhotic patients, that is associated to a high mortality