Nosocomial Infection Prevention Essay

The article Infection Control in Home Care was given by Emily Rhinehart in April 2001. This article is about the home care and infection control in the United States of America. This article stated that, in the past decades, the scope and intensity of home care have increased, whereas the strategies and prevention solutions of infection surveillance and control efforts have fallen behind (Rhinehart, 2001). Lack of applicable and consistent methods for surveillance and acute-care practices of prevention are needed to control infections. The article provides an understanding about the appropriate strategy and need of training to assess the infectious disease and their risk. In addition, the author has also stated the

However, everybody who has contact with the patient or the environment is entitled to relevant information that will enable them to reduce the risks of transmission to

Hospital acquired infections (HAIs) affect over 1.7 million patients each year, causing almost 100,000 deaths annually in the United States alone (Johnson, 2010). According to the World Health Organization, HAIs are the most frequent adverse event in the healthcare industry. Fortunately, most of these infections can be prevented with one single intervention, proper hand hygiene (“The Evidence,” n.d.). Four out of five pathogens that cause illness are spread by direct contact. Proper hand hygiene eliminates these pathogens and helps to prevent cross-contamination and HAIs (Linton, 2015; “Hand Hygiene,” n.d.). Reduction of cross-contamination and HAIs improves patient outcomes, increases employee wellness, and lowers health care costs. Adherence to proper hand hygiene is the single most important safety measure in the health care setting. However, for many years compliance to proper hand hygiene in the healthcare industry has been dismally low. New and inventive measures must be implemented to increase compliance to proper hand hygiene and lower the rate of hospital-acquired infections.

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

Ex Dx: risk for infection, imbal nut, impaired oral mucousa, risk for impaired skin integrity, social isolation, impaired tissue/skin integrity, role confusion, impaired breathing

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

Germs and many other diseases spread primarily through airborne particles, skin to skin contact, and or touching objects such as door handles, hospital buttons, or by sharing patient possessions. Nurses and other health care clinicians are constantly in physical contact with many different patients, who all have varying illness’ and diseases themselves. Many may also carry a

Burke J.P. (2003). Infection control- a problem for patient safety. New England Journal Medicine, 348(7):651-656.

As a leader in health care, it is important that employees have the proper education and training for compliance with infection control. An infection control practitioner should be assigned surveillance of infections, calculate infection rates, and report these numbers to the appropriate personnel. Clinical nurses, such as nurses, should have periodic evaluations to ensure they are practicing patient safety. There are many other key factors that should be implemented in health care facilities to improve infection control. First is hand hygiene; there could be random observers periodically monitoring a certain floor or department for hand sanitation practices. Secondly, is the health care environment. This includes, making sure employees are sanitizing surfaces and equipment, educating visitors and families on infection control measures, and properly using personal protective equipment. Improper use, wear, and removal of personal protective equipment can cause serious health consequences to the worker and the patients, which means employees need be continuously trained and educated on this equipment.

This paper will discuss the relationship of the number of nursing staff in relation to an increased risk of developing nosocomial infections. In healthcare, patients are at a high risk for nosocomial infections. These types of infections are of hospital origin. Especially in the intensive care unit (ICU), the incidence of nosocomial infections is reported to be about “2 to 5 times higher than in the general in-patient hospital population” (Dasgupta, Das, Chawan, & Hazra, 2015). As a result, the increased risk of morbidity and mortality in the ICU continues to be a severe matter in healthcare. For example, ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) is defined as “pneumonia

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

After microorganisms enter the patient’s body they can go to the lungs and cause pneumonia. Central line-bloodstream infections occur when microorganism enter the bloodstream by the intravenous line. Microorganisms are transfer into the blood stream by inadequate hand hygiene or improper intravenous fluid, tubing, and site care practice. Multidrug-resistant organisms can cause infections of the blood, skin, or organ systems. These infections can arise due to the overuse or misuse of antibiotics, which can result in the microorganisms becoming more resistant to antibiotic therapy. Methicillin-resistant Staphyloccocus aureus and Clostridium difficile are examples of this kind of infection. Health care employees need to know the different types of hospital acquired infections and how they are spread to be able to effectively prevent them.

Controlling infections in the hospital setting has been a major issue for hundreds of years. Patients have largely been effected by pathogens transferred from those appointed to care for them. Florence Nightingale became famous for changing the way we practice patient care. Her idea was simple yet powerful and it is still considered the standard worldwide. She promoted hand washing in order to reduce healthcare infections. Flash-forward a hundred years and we are now seeing infections increase through a different route. The CDC estimated about 31,100 central line associated blood stream infections occur each year (Control, 2015). According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the most commonly reported pathogens include coagulase-negative staphylococci, Staphylococcus aureus, enterococci, and Candida. (Tavianini, Deacon, Negrete, & Salapka, 2014). Although central lines was not yet a technology created in healthcare, implementing the fundamental skills as emphasized by Nightingale

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.

Research shows that Surgical site infections are preventable. According to the CDC, hand hygiene is the simplest approach to preventing the spread of infections and needs to be incorporated into the culture of the organization. Ensuring the use of infection control prevention is an important component of nursing care. Infection control prevention policies must be communicated undoubtedly to all employees. Staffers who do not comply must be re-educated to ensure that all are complying. Speaking up and pointing out that a nurse forgot to wash his or her hands, or notifying the surgical team that surgical instruments were not adequately cleaned may seem like small issues; but at the same time, not acknowledging a break in a sterile technique could mean the difference between life and death for a patient. One hospital that was struggling with high levels of infection related to surgical procedures, implemented a pre-procedure huddle as a team. This innovate way decreased the spread of infection and was a great way to improve the quality of care for patients. As mandated by the Joint commission, infection prevention personnel should provide multidisciplinary education on SSI prevention, to all team members, including