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Study finds hospitals should test water systems for bacteria

Infection Control Monitor, August 24, 2007

Hospitals should regularly test their water systems for bacteria that cause Legionella pneumonia, better known as Legionnaires' disease, according to a new study.

National infection control policies should be changed to require such testing, according to the study led by the University of Pittsburg School of Medicine, reported The Pittsburg Tribune-Review. The 20-hospital study showed that monitoring institutional water systems can help predict the risk of hospital-acquired Legionnaires' disease. "Only those hospitals that had high levels of Legionella bacteria in their water systems had patients who contracted Legionnaires' disease," said Victor L. Yu, MD, senior author of the study, published in Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology. Proactive monitoring of the water supply alerted physicians to the hidden risk of the disease for their patients.

Currently the CDC recommends hospitals and healthcare institutions monitor patients for pneumonia before testing water systems for Legionella.

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