Surgical site infections (SSIs) are the third most common hospital-associated infection and can lead to significant patient morbidity and healthcare costs. Identification of SSIs is key to surveillance and research but reliable assessment is challenging, particularly after hospital discharge when most SSIs present. Existing SSI measurement tools have limitations and their suitability for post-discharge surveillance is uncertain.
This study aimed to develop a single measure to identify SSI after hospital discharge, suitable for patient or observer completion.
A three-phase mixed methods study was undertaken: Phase 1, an analysis of existing tools and semi-structured interviews with patients and professionals to establish the content of the measure; Phase 2, development of questionnaire items suitable for patients and professionals; Phase 3, pre-testing the single measure to assess acceptability and understanding to both stakeholder groups. Interviews and pre-testing took place over 12 months in 2014-2015 with patients and professionals from five specialties recruited from two UK hospital Trusts.
Analyses of existing tools and interviews identified 19 important domains for assessing SSIs. Domains were developed into provisional questionnaire items. Pre-testing and iterative revision resulted in a final version with 16 items that were understood and easily completed by patients and observers (healthcare professionals).
A single patient and observer measure for post-discharge SSI assessment has been developed. Further testing of the validity, reliability and accuracy of the measure is underway.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 15. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 25 August 2026.
All research outputs
#2,957,460
of 31,684,203 outputs
Outputs from Journal of Infection Prevention
#40
of 333 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#47,771
of 450,553 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Journal of Infection Prevention
#3
of 13 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 31,684,203 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 90th percentile: it's in the top 10% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 333 research outputs from this source. They typically receive more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 9.0. This one has done well, scoring higher than 87% of its peers.
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We're also able to compare this research output to 13 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done well, scoring higher than 76% of its contemporaries.
