Risk Assessment Models for Venous Thromboembolism in Medical Inpatients.

Importance: Thromboprophylaxis is recommended for medical inpatients at risk of venous thromboembolism (VTE). Risk assessment models (RAMs) have been developed to stratify VTE risk, but a prospective head-to-head comparison of validated RAMs is lacking. Objectives: To prospectively validate an easy-to-use RAM, the simplified Geneva score, and compare its prognostic performance with previously validated RAMs. Design, Setting, and Participants: This prospective cohort study was conducted from June 18, 2020, to January 4, 2022, with a 90-day follow-up. A total of 4205 consecutive adults admitted to the general internal medicine departments of 3 Swiss university hospitals for hospitalization for more than 24 hours due to acute illness were screened for eligibility; 1352 without therapeutic anticoagulation were included. Exposures: At admission, items of 4 RAMs (ie, the simplified and original Geneva score, the Padua score, and the IMPROVE [International Medical Prevention Registry on Venous Thromboembolism] score) were collected. Patients were stratified into high and low VTE risk groups according to each RAM. Main Outcomes and Measures: Symptomatic VTE within 90 days. Results: Of 1352 medical inpatients (median age, 67 years [IQR, 54-77 years]; 762 men [55.4%]), 28 (2.1%) experienced VTE. Based on the simplified Geneva score, 854 patients (63.2%) were classified as high risk, with a 90-day VTE risk of 2.6% (n = 22; 95% CI, 1.7%-3.9%), and 498 patients (36.8%) were classified as low risk, with a 90-day VTE risk of 1.2% (n = 6; 95% CI, 0.6%-2.6%). Sensitivity of the simplified Geneva score was 78.6% (95% CI, 60.5%-89.8%) and specificity was 37.2% (95% CI, 34.6%-39.8%); the positive likelihood ratio of the simplified Geneva score was 1.25 (95% CI, 1.03-1.52) and the negative likelihood ratio was 0.58 (95% CI, 0.28-1.18). In head-to-head comparisons, sensitivity was highest for the original Geneva score (82.1%; 95% CI, 64.4%-92.1%), while specificity was highest for the IMPROVE score (70.4%; 95% CI, 67.9%-72.8%). After adjusting the VTE risk for thromboprophylaxis use and site, there was no significant difference between the high-risk and low-risk groups based on the simplified Geneva score (subhazard ratio, 2.04 [95% CI, 0.83-5.05]; P = .12) and other RAMs. Discriminative performance was poor for all RAMs, with an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve ranging from 53.8% (95% CI, 51.1%-56.5%) for the original Geneva score to 58.1% (95% CI, 55.4%-60.7%) for the simplified Geneva score. Conclusions and Relevance: This head-to-head comparison of validated RAMs found suboptimal accuracy and prognostic performance of the simplified Geneva score and other RAMs to predict hospital-acquired VTE in medical inpatients. Clinical usefulness of existing RAMs is questionable, highlighting the need for more accurate VTE prediction strategies.

Systematic review of healthcare-associated Burkholderia cepacia complex outbreaks: presentation, causes and outbreak control.

Background: Over the past decades, the Burkholderia cepacia complex (BCC) has been linked to multiple healthcare-associated outbreaks. No systematic analysis of these outbreaks has been carried out to date. The aim of this study was to conduct a systematic review of reports on nosocomial BCC outbreaks. Methods: Published studies from 1971 until 9/12/2019 presenting nosocomial BCC outbreaks were identified using Embase, Pubmed and abstracts from professional meetings. Results: We identified a total of 111 outbreak reports. Thirty-two percent of the affected institutions were academic hospitals and 43.8% community hospitals. The average outbreak duration was 198.6 ± 604.4 days. A total of 240 deaths (10% of the 2390 case patients) were reported but only 28 (1.2% of the 2390 case patients and 11.7% of the 240 deaths) were directly attributable to BCC. The source could be identified in 73.9% of the outbreaks; 53.2% were caused by contaminated medical solutions and medications, 12% were due to a contaminated disinfectant. In 28.2% of the outbreaks intrinsic product contamination was reported. Multidrug resistance was noted in 26.1% of the BCC strains. PFGE was the most frequently used typing method (43.2%) in the context of outbreak work-up. Conclusion: Medical products are the most frequent source of BCC outbreaks, representing over half of the identified sources, with 12% of the outbreaks caused by disinfectant products. Intrinsic product contamination was detected frequently, suggesting a need for stricter regulation. While BCC-related mortality was low, our systematic review revealed significant heterogeneity in both investigations and reporting of BCC outbreaks.