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Beau B. Bruce, Mitchell A. Blass, Henry M. Blumberg, Jeffrey L. Lennox, Carlos del Rio, C. Robert Horsburgh, Risk of Cryptosporidium parvum Transmission between Hospital Roommates, Clinical Infectious Diseases, Volume 31, Issue 4, October 2000, Pages 947–950, https://doi.org/10.1086/318147
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Abstract
Patients with active diarrhea caused by infection with Cryptosporidium parvum can potentially contaminate the environment, which could serve as a risk for transmission to other patients in a hospital setting. A retrospective cohort study was performed to quantify the risk of nosocomial roommate-to-roommate transmission of Cryptosporidium and to evaluate the need for isolation of Cryptosporidium-infected patients. Thirty-seven human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected roommates of 21 index patients with Cryptosporidium were identified between 1994 and 1996. Each exposed roommate (median CD4 cell count, 27cells/mm3) was matched to an HIV-infected, unexposed roommate with a similar CD4 cell count (median, 24 cells/mm3) who was present in the hospital during the same month but was not a roommate of a patient with Cryptosporidium infection. No patients with Cryptosporidium were identified among the 37 exposed roommates, and 1 case was identified among the 37 unexposed roommates. The risk ratio for chronic diarrhea was 0.80 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.23–2.75) and for death was 1.04 (95% CI, 0.75–1.44). These results suggest that isolation of adult patients with Cryptosporidium diarrhea is not necessary to prevent roommate-to-roommate transmission of Cryptosporidium.
