Archive for category Infection Control
Making a Tippy Tap
Posted by admin in Child Health, Epidemiology, FOOD POISONING, FOOD SAFETY, Healthy Eating, ICONS - Golden apple, Infection Control, Public Health and Health Protection Agencies, Vomiting on October 17th, 2012
COUNTRY : WORLDWIDE
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Global Handwashing Day 2012
Posted by admin in Diarrhoea, FOOD POISONING, Healthy Eating, ICONS - Golden apple, Infection Control, Public Health and Health Protection Agencies, Uncategorized on October 15th, 2012
Today, 15th October 2012 is Global Handwashing Day.
“Human feces are the main source of diarrheal pathogens. They are the source of shigellosis, typhoid, cholera, all other common endemic gastro-enteric infections and some respiratory infections such as influenza and pneumonia. A single gram of human feces can contain 10 million viruses and one million bacteria.
These pathogens are passed from an infected host to a new one via various routes but all of these illnesses emanate from feces. Removing excreta and cleaning hands with soap after contact with fecal material –from using the toilet or cleaning a child – prevents the transmission of the bacteria, viruses and protozoa that cause diarrheal diseases.
Other measures (food handling, water purification, and fly control) have an impact on these diseases as well, but sanitation and handwashing provide the necessary protection against fecal contact. They start by creating initial barriers to fecal pathogens from reaching the domestic environment. Handwashing with soap stops the transmission of disease agents and so can significantly reduce diarrhea and respiratory infections, and may impact skin and eye infections.
Research shows that children living in households exposed to handwashing promotion and soap had half the diarrheal rates of children living in control neighborhoods. Because handwashing can prevent the transmission of a variety of pathogens, it may be more effective than any single vaccine. Promoted on a wide enough scale, handwashing with soap can be thought of as a “do-it-yourself” vaccine. Ingraining the habit of handwashing could save more lives than any single vaccine or medical intervention.”
COUNTRY : WORLDWIDE
Why Handwashing with Soap?
Handwashing with soap is the most effective and inexpensive way to prevent diarrheal and acute respiratory infections, which take the lives of millions of children in developing countries every year. Together, they are responsible for the majority of all child deaths. Yet, despite its lifesaving potential, handwashing with soap is seldom practiced and difficult to promote.Turning handwashing with soap before eating and after using the toilet into an ingrained habit could save more lives than any single vaccine or medical intervention, cutting deaths from diarrhea by almost half and deaths from acute respiratory infections by one-quarter. A vast change in handwashing behavior is critical to meeting the Millennium Development Goal of reducing deaths among children under the age of five by two-thirds by 2015.
Global Handwashing Day focuses on children because not only do they suffer disproportionately from diarrheal and respiratory diseases and deaths, but research shows that children – the segment of society so often the most energetic, enthusiastic, and open to new ideas – can also be powerful agents for changing behaviors like handwashing with soap in their communities.
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Mobile phone contamination in health care workers
Posted by admin in ICONS - Stethescope and apple, Infection Control, MIcrobiology on August 22nd, 2011
I once worked with a doctor who was mildly obsessional. Well, maybe he was moderately obsessional. It was long before the days of mobile phones. One of his obsessions was to use baby wipes to clean his phone. When he used the phone he held it in his hand but never let it touch his ear, face or mouth. He washed his hands immediately afterwards. We all thought he was a bit loopy, but loveable.
I can also remember when everyone in hospitals became obsessed with infection control. It was probably about the time MRSA first appeared. Infection control nurses went around inspecting wards, taking swabs and chastising everyone for not washing their hands enough. There were many meetings. But in the midst of this, no-one gave much thought to computer keyboards as a source of contamination. Then it eventually dawned and some research was done demonstrating the obvious i.e. they were communal honey pots contaminated with all sorts of organisms. So that was taken care of.
This paper identifies the micro-organisms found on the mobile phones and the hands of health care workers in an operating room and in an Intensive Care Unit.
CONTAMINATION OF MOBILE PHONES WITH PATHOGENS
COUNTRY : TURKEY
The rate of bacterial contamination of mobile phones is 94.5%. The isolated microorganisms from mobile phones and hands were similar (Table 1). Some of them are known to cause nosocomial infections. Hand contamination rates of HCWs and their personal mobile phones are shown in Table 2. It was found that 49.0% of phones grew one bacterial species, 34.0% two different species, 11.5% three or more different species and no bacterial growth were identified in 5.5% of phones.
Those S. aureus strains isolated from mobile phones of 52.0% and those strains isolated from hands of 37.7% were methicillin resistant. The gram negative strains were isolated from mobile phones of 31.3% and the ceftazidime resistant strains from the hands were 39.5%. At the study period our nosocomial isolates at ICU were: 33.3% staphylococci, 21.4% non-fermentative gram negatives, 21.4% coliforms, 7.1% enterococci, 11.9% yeasts.
The rate of routine cleaning of HCW’s mobile phones was 10. 5%, which means 89.5% of the participants never cleaned their mobile phones. Although the assistant doctors’ phones have higher colony count there was no significant difference in the rates of specific types of bacterial growth and colony counts isolated on all groups’ mobile phones (Table 2).
25.5% of the entire study population had one or more rings. The mean colony count was higher in ring using staff’s phones but there was no significant difference between rate of contamination and colony count (Table 2) (p > 0.05).
Considering the number of people employed in the health care sector, there will be loads of phones taken home and so there is a possibility they may be a means of transferring multiple resistant microorganisms from hospital into the community. Mobile phones are usually each only used by a single person within the household, however the main household phone and remote controls for TVs are likely to be used by everyone in the family and are likely to be contaminated by the mobile phone flora of the household. It seems logical then to have a cleaning routine for all phones and remote controls as well as computer keyboards. Maybe the obsessional doctor I worked with all these years ago was not loopy after all!
CONTAMINATION OF MOBILE PHONES WITH PATHOGENS
COUNTRY : TURKEY
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