One in ten develops an SSI globally – 20% resistant to antibiotics

More than one in 10 (12%) patients around the world develops a surgical site infection within 30 days of gastrointestinal surgery, finds a study* of more than 12,500 people in 66 countries, published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases. 

Worryingly, more than one in five (22%) of these infections were resistant to the antibiotics given before surgery to ward off infections. 

“These findings begin to characterise the relationship between surgical site infections and global antimicrobial resistance,” says Dr Ewen Harrison, NIHR Unit on Global Surgery at the University of Edinburgh.