Hospital Acquired Infections ?

[anneasquith]

as above ^^^, is it any wonder HAI are more common, a tv programme on last night re newly qualified doctors first days on the wards................. they travelled to the hospital in their scrubs on various modes of transport including public transport, surely this is wrong ?

[mrs_overall]

In the last couple of days in hospital I have observed:

a female surgical registrar wearing a long sleeved blouse with frilly cuffs (what happened to the "bare to the elbow" rule?)
a female muslim doctor wearing a head scarf with long ends that dangled to her waist
a male doctor wearing a tie that dangled down while he was examining a patient

[LazyGun]

I think you have to be able to demonstrate that potentially pathogenic organisms are present on uniforms/scrubs etc, then you ideally need to be able to demonstrate that such organisms can pass to the patients.

There are reports in the health publications of pathogenic organisms being identified as being transferred from tourniquets, for instance, and although the link between say clothing and passage has not been conclusively demonstrated, the theoretical risk is there and so travelling around in scrubs etc, attending the restaurant/cafe on site, going outside for a craft smoke in your scrubs should all be discouraged....

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21864762

[murraymints]

happens all the time lazy..

[gness]

The main cause of HAI? Hospital staff. When you have to ask a consultant to remove his outdoor coat and wash his hands before examining an open wound you know there is no leadership and no-one on that ward is going to give a damn about hygiene.

[murraymints]

when I cared for FIL when he had to go into liberton hospital in Edinburgh, I was so horrified I took dettol sprays in each visit..

[Sqad]

Interesting topic........if you are talking about wound infections, then the main cause, in my opinion is the transfer of organisms from the hands of medical staff and nursing staff to the wound whilst "fiddling" with the dressings. Dangling ends, ties, blouses, outside dress, peephole bras and crotchless tights have got bugger all to do with cross infection and wounds.

It is ALL to do with not washing one's hands.

[Hopkirk]

Peephole bras and crotchless tights Sqad?

Which hospital did you work in?

[mrs_overall]

I just KNEW any response from our resident Head Porter (retired) would involve ladies underwwear

[Sqad]

hoppy...

\\\\\Which hospital did you work in?\\\

Whichever one where the nurses wore peephole bras and crocthless tights........the female nurses that is................a bit of a gamble today...

[naomi24]

In my (considerable) experience standards have slipped enormously. Hospitals are dirty and staff don't appear to take hygiene seriously.

[Sqad]

To go even further.......I cannot see any good reason why surgeons wear masks in the operating theatre.............wound infection is in the theatre is due to inadequate haemostasis by the surgeon.

[ummmm]

/Hospitals are dirty and staff don't appear to take hygiene seriously. /

They don't seem to take their job seriously.

[mrs_overall]

I have an ongoing complaint against one hospital ward. SOME of my complaints include:
A bowl of vomit left on the locker by my bedside for FOUR days
Getting out of bed and a used Venflon needle left on the floor going straight through my foot
My table and bedside locker not being wiped for four days. They had bloodstains and used used bits of cotton wool etc on them
There are many more points in my complaint

[gness]

Picture it Sqad.....if you are holding your dangling bits out of the way they are going to be very buggy and washed less often than hands.....Prefer my consultant not to fiddle with me while wearing the coat he had on while propping up the bar the night before.

[237SJ]

When I was having a minor op a few years ago a staff member came to talk to me wearing Crocs with bare feet. While he was talking he was slipping his feet out of the shoes and standing on the floor in bare feet. Very sloppy (and unhygienic).

[gness]

Some surgeons dribble.

[237SJ]

Forgot to say - he was the anaesthetist.

[mrs_overall]

Gness, are you talking about Sqad and ladies underwear catalogues?

[woofgang]

I used to work in the community, visiting patients at home. The team consisted (still does but I am now retired) of OT's, Physios, Nurses and our support staff We wore our uniforms from house to house (some pretty grotty houses) and sometimes we also did special assessments like taking someone to the local supermarket to see how best to suggest that they manage shopping etcetera. While we would do our best to avoid the worst of the dirt in the dirtiest houses, we had an extremely low rate of cross infection from wound to wound and of carriage of things like Noro.

This was, in the opinion of our local infection control team, because we were obsessive about hand washing and use of gel hand cleansers. The "bare to the elbow" rule is to facilitate handwashing because if you don't bare wrists and above, you won't be inclined to give the hands a good wash. We also actively discouraged the heros and heroines who struggle to work with colds and stomach upsets and generously shared the bugs around.

The other advantage that home care has over hospitals is that at home you are likely to have been in contact with all the bugs that you will meet in that environment and your own natural defences will largely be adequate to deal with them, even if your immune system is somewhat below par. In hospitals, you meet new infection challenges from other people. Its basically the same reason that children get lots of buggy things when they first start school or playgroup and again young adults do when they go off to college or first job.
The other proven, IIRC, infection risk is from rings because they harbour dead skin cells and so on.

[Hopkirk]

Do ties ever get washed?