[Bacteremia at a community hospital during a 1-yr period. Epidemiologic, clinical and prognostic aspects].

To evaluate the epidemiology, etiology, mortality and prognostic factors of bacteremia in a district hospital, we carried out a retrospective study of all blood cultures (Bc) performed in 1987 in our institution. The criteria for contamination community or hospital acquired disease, and terminal or rapidly fatal disease were those commonly accepted. Two patients were excluded owing to incomplete data. Overall 1,693 Bcs were performed; 257 of these were positive, 189 were considered as true positive (11.1%) and corresponded to 70 episodes of bacteremia (9.1/1000 admitted patients). Sixty-eight patients were included, 48 from the community and 20 of hospital origin. The male/female ratio was 43/25. There was shock in 27% of the community acquired and in 55% of the hospital acquired cases (p less than 0.1). There were no mortality differences between both groups, but there were differences in the spectrum of causative organisms. A comparison with a previous series from our institution was made. Its results shown some peculiarities of the disease in our area.