Abstract

The relative and absolute incidences of community-acquired bacterial and tuberculous pulmonary infections, in patients admitted to a public municipal hospital, and the clinical and radiographic characteristics of these infections were retrospectively determined for the first time in 20 years. The data were compared to those previously reported in the literature. Such data were also specifically determined for alcoholics and compared to those found in nonalcoholics. The absolute numbers of infections due to pneumococci and anaerobes, and to tuberculosis, were not dissimilar to those reported in the literature, even though relatively few hemophilus infections were documented. The lack of Klebsiella sp infections was remarkable but not unexpected. Alcoholic patients had significantly higher rates of tuberculosis, cavitary disease, lung disease presumably due to anaerobes, and blood-culture-positive pneumonia. The relative concordance of our results for bacterial and tuberculous infections with those predicted from the published literature was striking. The high frequency of tuberculosis in our patients was particularly striking at a time when the incidence of tuberculosis nationwide, in patients without acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, has declined significantly.