Infection in hospitals

Press, 13 June 1979, Page 12

Infection in hospitals

About 16 pet cent of patients left hospitals with infections and diseases they did not have when they were admitted, an American expert on hospital sanitation? Dr B. Y. Litsky, has said in Christchurch. In the United States twice as many patients died of infections caught inside hospitals as were killed on the roads. About 33M pat en>s entered United States hospitals each year: of these, 100.000 died as a result of an infection incurred in hospital. Dr Litsky is an international consultant on environmental microbiology, specialising in the prevention of cross-infection. She is in New Zealand on a lecture tour organised by Crothall Hospital Services. Hospitals were often agencies for the collection and release of germs, she said. Everyone’s skin shed microbes. Some motels were

more hygenic than hospitals simply because they slept only one in a room. Dr Litsky said that millions of dollars would come off health bills once infection levels were controlled. Efforts had been spent identifying germs, and knowing what diseases they caused, not on controlling microbe levels.

Hospitals should be singlestorey: it took only eight minutes for that air to move from an isolation ward up a stair-well into wards above, Dr Litsky said. Dormitory wards, even two-bed rooms,

: were outmoded because of • possibilities of cross-in-I fection. Surgeons should wear clothing made of non-woven j materials; paper and syn-j thetic fibres had beeni proven more germ-resistant! than muslin. ! Instruments were a “very: ibig cause” of .infection ini ithe United States; probably; 'more than in New Zealand! I where fewer instruments! I seemed to be used. In the i United States, a catheter I kept in place more than 72 i hours usually caused inIfection. Instruments should be! I sterilised after every case,; | Dr Litsky said. Brooms did not belong in i hospitals; wet vacuum pickups were best. It was not ; unusual for germs on a floor Ito rise to ceiling level, given , the speed of trolleys and air draughts. Dr Litsky said that al- | though initial measures to i control infection levels in .hospitals would be high.

fl there would be a net saving.] •! Even if books did not bai-1 lance, it was better they ■ were in deficit than human' 11 life needlessly lost. ■I Medical staff and micro-! i (biologists and architects; J should plan hospitals to sep arate, at every possible! !point, the clean" from the! 11 dirty. Visitors to hospitals] Hshould be prepared to shed! I'outer clothing, at least, be-j s! fore they entered wards.' I :■! An ideal set-up already in] r use stationed the nurse at; ! the centre of a semi-circular -! arrangement of glass-walled isingle-bed rooms. She could T see all patients ar a glance, .land patients had privacy by I remote-controlled shutters; ijset inside the glass walls. I Visitors did not enter! t rooms but viewed and spoke; rifrom outside the glass. I i: The hospital of the future' rj would be inflatable and disposable, Dr Litsky forecast. -!Visitors would not enter at )iall but would view patients t from a patio outside glass . i rooms.