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Although Clostridium difficile–associated diarrheal infection (CDI) was originally identified as a hospital-acquired infection, the past decade has seen a rising incidence of community-acquired CDI. To look for community reservoirs of the pathogen, Canadian investigators performed a prospective assessment of C. difficile carriage and infection in household human contacts and pets of patients with CDI.
Among 1397 CDI patients seen at 3 tertiary care hospitals, the researchers were able to collect stool or rectal samples from the household contacts and domestic pets of 51 patients. They found that 3 (6%) of 50 adult contacts and 6 (35%) of 17 pediatric contacts of the CDI patients carried C. difficile, with the isolates identical to the CDI in…