Essay on Health Associated Infections

Dirty equipment – having dirty equipment which is not cleaned between patients can spread infection very fast lots of bacteria can be spread on a blood pressure cuff for example.

Through medical advances in technology and practice, nurses have been afforded the opportunity to provide lifesaving care to patients. However, this lifesaving care comes with the risk of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs). Generally speaking, HAIs are infections directly related with the delivery of healthcare and are often caused by viral, bacterial or

Implementation of patient care practices for infection control is the role of the nursing staff. Nurses are responsible for maintaining hygiene, consistent with hospital policies and good nursing practice on the ward and monitoring aseptic techniques, including hand-washing and use of isolation. It is also in their scope of practice to promptly report to the attending physician any evidence of infection in patients under the nurse’s care and initiating patient isolation and ordering culture specimens from any patient showing signs of a communicable disease, when the physician is not immediately available. Limiting patient exposure to infections from visitors, hospital staff, other patients, or equipment used for diagnosis or treatment and maintaining

Hospital- acquired infections is also another concern for patients. The common health-acquired infections include surgical site infections, ventilator – associated pneumonia, catheter-associated urinary tract infections, blood stream and bacterial infections. Annually, these types of infections cost the U.S. about $9.8 billion. Topping the list for the most costly burden are surgical-site infections.

Healthcare is an ever-growing, booming industry and as medical technology advances so should our standards of care. Once known as hospital acquired “nosocomial” infections, Healthcare Associated Infections (HAIs) are still afflicting the very patients we are to be treating. These patients could be our loved ones, friends, and family so to say that, “1 in 25 hospital patients have at least one HAI in a U.S. acute care hospital” (CDC, 2015), is still one too many.

Patients have varying susceptibility to develop an infection after exposure to a pathogenic organism. Some people have innate protective mechanisms and will never develop symptomatic disease and others exposed to the same microorganism may establish a commensal relationship and retain the organisms as an asymptomatic carrier (colonization) or develop an active disease process. Intrinsic risk factors predispose patients to HAIs. The higher likelihood of infection is reflected in vulnerable patients who are immunocompromised, underlying diseases, severity of illness, immunosuppressive medications, or medical/surgical treatments (Bauman, 2011). Extrinsic risk factors include surgical or other invasive procedures, diagnostic or therapeutic interventions (e.g., invasive devices, implanted foreign bodies, organ transplantations, immunosuppressive medications), and personnel exposures. In addition to providing a portal of entry for microbial colonization or infection, they also facilitate transfer of pathogens from one part of the patient’s body to another, from health care worker to patient, or from patient to health care

Hospital-acquired infections (HAIs), specifically those involving multi-drug resistant organisms such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) are associated with increased morbidity and mortality, as well as higher cost of healthcare and longer length of hospital stays for patients. Each year, millions of people acquire infections while receiving care, treatment, and services in hospitals and other health care organizations.

As a hospital, quality care should be a priority for patients that are going to be treated for a sickness, or any type of procedure that is going to take place. A lot of times a patient gets an infection while they were at the hospital, on top of being treated for what they original came in for. Health facilities should be environments of healing, which they are, but they also have tons of various types of germs and infections, which grasp onto individuals that have weak immune systems/are sick. Some infections that are at hospitals are Tuberculosis, VRE, VAP, C-Diff, UTI, and MRSA. Preventive measures to stop the spread of the infections is lacking tremendously in the work and aim to provide safety for all patient’s health. The work

Hospital acquired infections (HAI) are never good. Moreover, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in 25 patients will develop an infection which was procured during their stay in a hospital (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2015). Twenty percent of these HAI are due to staphylococcus aureus, better known as simply Staph (Statisticbrain.com, 2015).

Hospital acquired infection is also known as nosocomial infections, which can be caused by viruses, bacteria or fungal pathogen. It is an infection that a patient can acquire while they are in hospital or another health care facility for a reason other than the infection. So most of the time, when a patient get nosocomial infection, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) does not cover that treatment, and it will be the hospital charge, because the infection is caused by a poor conditions at the hospital or the health care facility, or perhaps because hospital staff did not following proper procedures. One infection that a patient can develop in hospital or health care facility is kin ulcer, which is also known as skin pressure injury.

Healthcare associated infections (HAI’S) appear in hospitals and other healthcare facilities around the world. Many infections are within the (HAI’S), but the main infections are: Catheter-associated urinary tract infection, Surgical site infection, and Ventilator-associated pneumonia. (www.CDC.gov). In healthcare many infections are in effective because the infections are constantly coming through. In non-healthcare facilities infections are still effective because the infections are throughout our community.

CAUTI is the most frequent type of HAI, and represents as much as 80% of HAIs in hospitals.(The Joint Commission, 2011) This high occurrence of infection in hospitals creates a high concern in patient centered care. The hospital can only do so much, what 's important is exactly how the nurse conducts herself. Starting

Infection control is very important in the health care profession. Health care professionals, who do not practice proper infection control, allow themselves to become susceptible to a number of infections. Among the most dreaded of these infections are: hepatitis B (HBV), hepatitis C (HCV), and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Another infection which has more recently increased in prevalence is methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). These infections are all treated differently. Each infection has its own symptoms, classifications, and incubation periods. These infections are transmitted in very similar fashions, but they do not all target the same population.

Infection control within a healthcare facility is the prevention of the spread of many microorganisms from patient to patient, patient to a member of staff and also from the staff member to the patient that are in there care. The World Health Organisation have defined healthcare associated infections as an infection occurring in a patient in a hospital or other healthcare facility in whom the infection was not present or incubating at the time of admission. Every healthcare facility from hospitals to general practitioners office should have a designated member of staff or a team of people who ensure that the infection control procedures are abided by and adhered to at all times in order to protect both staff and patients. More than 300,000 people each year are affected by a healthcare associated infection and the cost of treatment for these patients is over £3,000 and there is also the cost of treatment after discharge.

Healthcare related infections doctors can get while treating patients have become a major problem around the world. Thousands of doctors are diagnosed with infections and diseases all around the world, after treating patients. This issue has been escalading at a faster rate for the past decade. What is a health care related infection? To answer this, we must first establish a commonality in language: namely what causes these health-related infections? Healthcare associated infections are infections that patients receiving treatment for a specific kind of condition during a hospital visit or a hospital stay are acquired by an infection other than the condition they are getting treatment for. This not only affect patients, but a major