Researchers reported on Tuesday that a common form of diarrhea is most spread in the U.S. hospitals than initially believed. The bacteria which cause the intestinal problems can be deadly sometimes. Researchers advise people to use better ways of hygiene and to take the antibiotics more carefully.

The Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology has released a statement announcing that 13 out of 1,000 hospital patients are infected with the bacteria called Clostridium difficile. These results were 20 times bigger than the previous ones and the statistics show that every day will bring in 7,000 new patients infected.

Sounds like an outbreak? Dr. William Jarvis, the health-care epidemiologist who led the study, said that the U.S. population has a rather important issue, that of weight. The Americans become frailer as they get older and they are at greater risk to get infected with the bacteria and die because of it.

Jarvis added that the C. difficile can differ from a simple diarrhea to the “perforation of the bowel requiring surgery ... shock and death." The study took place only one day sometime between May and August of 2008 at 648 hospitals when 1200 members of the APIC went to collect information about the C. difficile diagnosed patients.

Jarvis explained that the bacterium doesn’t grow in cultures and it makes it difficult for doctors to diagnose it. So they make a test that usually fails for 25%. Also, because the C. difficile is not a reportable disease, very few records of it are kept inside the hospitals.