Comparative analysis of risk factors for ventriculostomy-related ventriculitis

Abstract

Objective The aim of this study is to analyze the risk factors of ventriculostomy-related ventriculitis.Methods Total 71 patients were placed external ventricular drainage catheters and divided into ventriculitis group and control group.Clinical variables such as age,sex,prior clinical diagnosis,duration of external ventricular drainage,total numbers of catheters per person,and outcome were analyzed contrastively in theses cases.Results Total 96 catheters were placed in 71 patients.Among these patients,13 cases were noted presenting infection,indicating the incidence is 18％.And there were 8 males (11％) and 5 females (7％) in the 13 cases.The mean age of infected patients was 32.9 years.Each patient had 1.69 catheters.The mean of the duration of catheter was 18.5 days.The prior clinical diagnosis of the 13 patients was trauma (23％),tumor (23％),intraventricular hemorrhage (38％) and acute hydrocephalus after aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage (15％) respectively.The results of statistical analysis showed the prior clinical diagnosis and the number of catheters were the risk factors of ventriculostomy-related ventriculitis.Conclusions The patient's underlying diagnosis and the number of catheters were associated with the risk of developing ventriculitis.Moreover,the longer the duration of external ventricular drainage catheter,the more likely the patient seemed to develop ventriculitis.But the age and gender of the patients are not related to ventriculostomy-related ventriculitis. Key words: Ventriculostomy; Ventriculitis; Risk factors