Journal of Hospital Infection

BACKGROUND: Obtaining detailed insights into people's unique hand hygiene behaviour could play an important role in developing the most effective long-term hand hygiene compliance (HHC) interventions. AIM: To investigate the effect of two feedback interventions provided by an electronic hand hygiene monitoring system (EHHMS) on sustained HHC improvement, individual responsiveness, and prevention of hospital-acquired bloodstream infections (HABSI) and urinary tract infections (HAUTI)...

BACKGROUND: Disinfection of gloves might reduce the the workload of healthcare workers, protect the environment, and bring economic benefits. Thus, the safety of hand hygiene of gloved hands is an important issue. AIM: We aimed to evaluate the risk of microbial transmission by comparing residual microorganisms after multiple patient contacts, with or without gloves, in clinical practice. METHODS: Researchers, two with gloved hands (single or double gloves) and one with bare hands, made rounds of patients, followed by alcohol-based hand rub...

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BACKGROUND: Bacterial infections are common during induction therapy in children and adolescents with acute leukaemia (AL) and may cause infection-related mortality. AIM: This study aimed to determine the efficacy and safety of prophylactic antibiotics in paediatric patients with AL receiving induction chemotherapy. METHODS: From three English databases and four Chinese databases, we searched for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and cohort studies that compared prophylactic antibiotics to placebo, no prophylaxis, or compared one antibiotic versus another in paediatric patients with AL undergoing induction chemotherapy...

BACKGROUND: Non-enveloped viruses are particularly resistant to disinfectants, so to prevent and control the spread of virus infections, disinfectants with proven virucidal activity must be used. However, a test such as EN 1500, which uses an internal standard as reference treatment for determining the bactericidal efficacy of hand rubs, is still lacking. We aimed to establish a European standard for testing the in vivo efficacy of hand rubs against non-enveloped viruses. METHOD: First, concentration and mode of application of ethanol as reference were determined...

The aim of the present study was to estimate the current incidence, complications and costs of BSI attributable to PVC. Patients with PVC-related BSI (cases) were matched with patients without PVC-related BSI (controls). From January 1st, 2018 to March 31th, 2020 9,833 out of 113,068 patients visiting the emergency department (9%) were hospitalised in a medical ward after insertion of a PVC. Among them, 581 (6%) had at least one positive blood culture (BC). Twenty-five (4%) of these were judged as having a PVC-related BSI...

BACKGROUND: ESBL-producing Enterobacteriaceae (eESBL) have a high prevalence in hospitals but real-time monitoring of nosocomial acquisition through conventional typing methods is challenging. Moreover, patient-to-patient transmission varies between the main species, namely Escherichia coli, and Klebsiella pneumoniae, then questioning the relevance of applying identical preventive measures. AIM: To detect eESBL cross-transmission events (CTE) using combination of quantitative antibiogram with epidemiological data (combined-QA), and to rule on the effectiveness of standard or contact precautions for eESBL species...

BACKGROUND: The global COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a greater interest in improving the ventilation of indoor environments in order to remove aerosolized virus and thus reduce transmission. Air purification systems have been proposed as a solution to improve aerosol removal. AIM: The aim is to determine the efficacy of air purification systems in reducing the viral load in environmental air of a room. METHODS: A containment room equipped with HEPA filter on air intake and exhaust was constructed...

BACKGROUND: Notifications to the Norwegian Institute of Public Health of outbreaks in Norwegian healthcare institutions are mandatory by law, but underreporting is suspected due to failure to identify clusters, or because of human or system-based factors. This study aimed to establish and describe a fully automatic, register-based surveillance system to identify clusters of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) of SARS-CoV-2 in hospitals and compare these with outbreaks notified through the mandated outbreak system Vesuv...

BACKGROUND: Anaesthesia induction is a fast-paced, complex activity that involves a high density of hand-to-surface exposures. Hand hygiene (HH) adherence has been reported to be low, which bears the potential for unnoticed pathogen transmission between consecutive patients. Therefore, we aimed to study the fit of the WHO's five moments of HH concept to the anaesthesia induction workflow. METHODS: We analysed video recordings of 59 anaesthesia inductions according to the WHO HH observation method considering each hand-to-surface exposure of every involved anaesthesia provider...

BACKGROUND: More than 160,000 central-line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSIs) are estimated for Europe each year leading to about 25,000 deaths. We aimed at characterising the contamination of administration sets in suspected CLABSI cases in the intensive care unit (ICU). METHODS: In ICU patients (period 02/2017-02/2018) with suspected CLABSI, all sampled central venous catheters (CVCs) were examined in 4 segments (from CVC tip to connected tubing systems) for contamination...

BACKGROUND: Healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) are a serious global public health issue. However, a comprehensive analysis of risk factors for HAIs has yet been undertaken at a large scale among general hospitals in China. The aim of this review is to assess risk factors associated with HAIs in Chinese general hospitals. METHODS: Medline, EMBASE and Chinese Journals Online databases were searched to find studies published from January 1st 2001 to May 31st 2022...

IMPORTANCE: Contact precautions are widely used to prevent the transmission of carbapenem-resistant organisms (CROs) in hospital wards. However, evidence for effectiveness in natural hospital environments is limited. OBJECTIVE: To determine which contact precautions, healthcare-worker-patient interactions, and patient and ward characteristics are associated with greater CRO infection or colonization risk. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: CRO clinical and surveillance cultures from two high-acuity wards were assessed through probabilistic modeling to characterize a susceptible patient's risk of CRO infection or colonization during ward stay...

BACKGROUND: The first epidemic wave of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in Scotland resulted in high case numbers and mortality in care homes. In Lothian, over a third of care homes reported an outbreak while there was limited testing of hospital patients discharged to care homes. AIM: Investigate hospital discharges as a source of SARS-CoV-2 introduction into care homes during the first epidemic wave. METHODS: A clinical review was performed for all discharges from hospitals to care homes starting 1st March 2020 to 31st May 2020...

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BACKGROUND: Intestinal clearance of carbapenemase-producing Enterobacterales (CPE-IC) is a cornerstone to discontinue isolation precautions for CPE patients in hospitals. This study aimed to evaluate the time to spontaneous CPE-IC and identify its potential associated risk factors. METHODS: This retrospective cohort study was carried out between January 2018 and September 2020 on all patients in a 3200-bed teaching referral hospital with confirmed CPE intestinal carriage...

BACKGROUND: Hand hygiene compliance is important for the prevention of healthcare-associated infections. The conventional method of measuring hand disinfection guidelines involves an external observer watching the staff personnel, which introduces bias, and observations are only made for a set period of time. An unbiased, non-invasive automated system for assessing hand sanitisation actions can provide a better estimate of compliance. AIM: To develop an automated detector to assess hand hygiene compliance in hospitals, without bias from an external observer, capable of making observations at different times of the day, as non-invasive as possible by using only one camera, and collecting as much information as possible from 2D video footage...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.