A 62-year-old woman undergoes total hip replacement with a prosthetic implant. She returns 55 days after surgery with wound discharge, pain, and purulent drainage from the surgical site. For national surgical site infection surveillance purposes, an infection at this site following prosthetic implant surgery is reportable up to:

• A 14 days after the operation
• B 90 days after the operation ✓
• C 30 days after the operation only
• D 12 months after the operation

Explanation

Surveillance definitions allow 30 days to detect and report a surgical site infection after any operation, but the surveillance window extends to 90 days when foreign material such as a prosthetic joint implant is placed, because low-virulence organisms like coagulase-negative staphylococci can cause delayed implant infections. Day 55 falls inside this 90-day window, whereas option C would wrongly exclude it and option D overstates the surveillance period.

Reference: Bailey and Love's Short Practice of Surgery, 27th ed.

High-yield for: NEET PGINI-CETNExTFMGEUSMLEPLABMRCP

Written and medically reviewed by the StethoPrep medical team.