Device associated healthcare associated infections in a pediatric intensive care unit of a Tertiary Care Hospital, Pakistan.

Objective: To determine the frequency of Ventilator associated Pneumonia (VAP), Central Line Associated Blood Stream Infection (CLABSI) and Catheter Associated Urinary Tract infection (CAUTI) by using standardized criteria established by Center of disease control and prevention. Study Design: Cross-sectional study. Setting: PICU of Aga Khan University Hospital (AKUH). Period: (August 2015 to January 2016). Material & Methods: Data was collected on a pre-coded proforma. Data was entered and analyzed through SPSS. Results: 156 patients were enrolled. 102 (65.4%) were male. Mean age was 57.59 months. Mean length of stay was 5.6 days. Patient and Device days were 546 and 958 respectively. Device utilization ratio was 0.56. Four Device associated infections (DAI) were identified during study period with a DAI Rate of 4.17 per 1000 device days. All DAI were CLABSIs. Enterococcus was the most frequent bacterial isolate. Conclusion: DAI are highly prevalent in low resource countries, especially in intensive care areas including PICUs. In our setup, CLABSI are increasing while VAP and CAUTI are decreasing.