ObjectiveTo analyze infections of the surgical site among patients undergoing clean-wound surgery for correction of femoral fractures.MethodsThis was a historical cohort study developed in a large-sized hospital in Belo Horizonte. Data covering the period from July 2007 to July 2009 were gathered from the records in electronic medical files, relating to the characteristics of the patients, surgical procedures and surgical infections. The risk factors for infection were identified by means of statistical tests on bilateral hypotheses, taking the significance level to be 5%. Continuous variables were evaluated using Student's t test. Categorical variables were evaluated using the chi-square test, or Fisher's exact test, when necessary. For each factor under analysis, a point estimate and the 95% confidence interval for the relative risk were obtained. In the final stage of the study, multivariate logistic regression analysis was performed.Results432 patients who underwent clean-wound surgery for correcting femoral fractures were included in this study. The rate of incidence of surgical site infections was 4.9% and the risk factors identified were the presence of stroke (odds ratio, OR = 5.0) and length of preoperative hospital stay greater than four days (OR = 3.3).ConclusionTo prevent surgical site infections in operations for treating femoral fractures, measures involving assessment of patients’ clinical conditions by a multiprofessional team, reduction of the length of preoperative hospital stay and prevention of complications resulting from infections will be necessary.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.