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Whats the single most important thing intensive care units can do to avoid the disasters that can happen when patients are transported to and from hospital departments? The most important factor is having a critical care doctor or head ICU nurse present to quarterback the move, says pediatrician Robert F. Patterson, MD, FAAP, critical care intensivist at Nemours Childrens Clinic in Pensacola, Fla.
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Though controversial due to fears of rising antibiotic resistance, it appears that minute amounts of vancomycin in heparin lock solutions can dramatically reduce deadly bloodstream infections in neonates under intensive care, a leading researcher has found.
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Continuing her high-profile presence in infection control, Julie Gerberding, MD, MPH, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, emphasizes that the CDCs landmark new hand hygiene guidelines are now the de facto standard of care for the nations health care settings.
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A new survey of various health care providers who give medications through injections reveals that 3% of anesthesiologists admit reusing the same needles and syringes on multiple patients, according to the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists.
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In response to strong protests from infection control professionals, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations has dropped plans to reduce the number of infection control standards in 2004, Hospital Infection Control has learned.
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Infection control professionals had a median salary in the $50,000-$59,000 bracket, but budget-crunched hospitals held most ICPs to raises at l% to 3%, according to the 2002 salary survey by Hospital Infection Control.
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Concerned about rising vancomycin resistance and a growing patient population in dialysis, public health officials are taking a hard look at infection control problems in the setting.
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In hospitals with high patient-to-nurse ratios, surgical patients experience higher risk-adjusted 30-day mortality and failure-to-rescue rates (deaths following complications), the authors found.
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A critical new weapon is available in the struggle to deliver appropriate and timely post-exposure prophylaxis to health care workers who have percutaneous blood exposures.