Enterococcal infections in a Greek intensive care unit: A 5-y study

In this study we determined the incidence, resistance pattern, and mortalit y rate associated with infection caused by Enterococcus faecalis and Entero coccus faecium among patients in a multidisciplinary intensive care unit (I CU), A total of 111 patients with E, faecalis and 60 with E, faecium infect ions were identified during a 5-y period (1992-96), We observed an increase in the incidence of enterococcal infections (from 5.46 to 8.46 per 1000 pa tients-days, p = 0.0112), due mainly to the increased incidence of E, faeci um (from 0.45 to 4.06 per 1000 patients-days, p = 0.002). Blood was the mos t common site of enterococcus isolation. E, faecium was more resistant to a ntibiotics than E, faecalis, but no vancomycin resistant enterococcus was i solated. Patients with E, faecium infection had a significantly higher mort ality than patients with E, faecalis infection (66% vs. 41.5%, p = 0.0035 f or infection from any site and 85.7 vs, 47.7%, p = 0.012 for bacteremic pat ients).