ArticleBritish journal of neurosurgery2016
Ventriculostomy-related infections: The performance of different definitions for diagnosing infection.
Article in British journal of neurosurgery, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 50 citations in OpenAlex.
- A systematic review of reviews on ventriculostomy related infection definitions: A fundamental problem.Neurosurgical review · 2025Pooled it
- Incidence and patient-related risk factors for external ventricular drain-related cerebrospinal fluid infections.Brain & spine · 2026Article
- Performance of routine surveillance diagnostics of external ventricular drain-associated infections in a critical care setting: a retrospective cohort study.BMC infectious diseases · 2025Article
- Response to letter: Ventriculostomy-associated infection (VAI) in patients with acute brain injury-a retrospective study.Acta neurochirurgica · 2024Article
- Ventriculostomy-associated infection (VAI) in patients with acute brain injury-a retrospective study.Acta neurochirurgica · 2024Article
- Healthcare-Associated Ventriculitis in Children during COVID-19 Pandemic: Clinical Characteristics and Outcome of a First Infection.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- External ventriculostomy-associated infection reduction after updating a care bundle.Annals of clinical microbiology and antimicrobials · 2023Article
- Dynamic Intracranial Pressure Waveform Morphology Predicts Ventriculitis.Neurocritical care · 2022Article
- Plasma Inflammatory Markers and Ventriculostomy-Related Infection in Patients With Hemorrhagic Stroke: A Retrospective and Descriptive Study.Frontiers in neurology · 2022Article
- Current Perspectives on the Diagnosis and Management of Healthcare-Associated Ventriculitis and Meningitis.Infection and drug resistance · 2022Review
- Cerebrospinal fluid cell count variability is a major confounding factor in external ventricular drain-associated infection surveillance diagnostics: a prospective observational study.Critical care (London, England) · 2021Observational
- Challenges in the Management of Gram-Negative Bacterial Infections in Patients With Ventriculoperitoneal Shunt.Cureus · 2021Review
- Use of Clustering to Investigate Changes in Intracranial Pressure Waveform Morphology in Patients with Ventriculitis.Acta neurochirurgica. Supplement · 2021Article
- Diagnostic Approach to Health Care- and Device-Associated Central Nervous System Infections.Journal of clinical microbiology · 2018Review
- Comparing External Ventricular Drains-Related Ventriculitis Surveillance Definitions.Infection control and hospital epidemiology · 2017Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
introductionComparison of rates of ventriculostomy-related infections (VRIs) across institutions is difficult due to the lack of a standard definition. We sought to review published definitions of VRI and apply them to a test cohort to determine the degree of variability in VRI diagnosis. MATERIALS AND
methodsWe conducted a PubMed search for definitions of VRI using the search strings "ventriculostomy-related infection" and "ventriculostomy-associated infection." We applied these definitions to a test cohort of 18 positive cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) cultures taken from ventriculostomies at two institutions to compare the frequency of infection using each definition.
resultsWe found 16 unique definitions of VRI. When the definitions were applied to the test cohort, the frequency of infection ranged from 22 to 94% (median 61% with interquartile range (IQR) 56-74%). The concordance between VRI diagnosis and treatment with VRI-directed antibiotics for at least seven days ranged from 56 to 89% (median: 72%, IQR: 71-78%).
conclusionsThe myriad of definitions in the literature produce widely different frequencies of infection. In order to compare rates of VRI between institutions for the purposes of qualitative metrics and research, a consistent definition of VRI is needed.
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Registered trials
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