The genomic investigation requires “a long time” to establish whether the bacterium identified in the three newborns in the neonatal intensive care unit of the Verona hospital is of the same strain as four years ago, the “Citrobacter” which caused one death and injuries in other children.
The Veronese integrated university hospital (Aou) specifies this in a note.
While the conditions of the three test-positive children do not cause concern, the obstetric-gynecological emergency room remains active for pregnancy emergencies at any gestational age, and for all pregnancies beyond the 34th week. An ambulance transport service has been activated for preterm women already hospitalized in labor, for whom clinicians deem it safe to transfer to other Venetian facilities.
The alert was triggered last Friday, when the surveillance system for admissions and patients in Neonatal Intensive Care (NICU), thanks to the advanced test used to search for Citrobacter koseri, reported an anomalous result, for the first time in four years . This triggered the rigid isolation and increased protection protocols in the department (extraordinary checks, convening of the Hospital Infection Group and Hospital Infection Commission). As a precaution, hospitalizations of pregnant women below the 33rd week of gestation were immediately suspended, as premature births require hospitalization in the ICU in most cases.
The Aou also specifies that the water distributed in the hospital is safe because it is subjected to systematic checks, and all the water points to which patients are exposed are equipped with anti-bacterial filters. Tap water was the cause of the Citrobacter infection four years ago.
The results of the investigations on the three premature newborns who tested positive for the bacterium have reduced the alert.
One newborn has already been discharged home in good condition, a second has tested negative and only one is still positive but without signs of infection, so he is fine.
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