Consistent microbial surveillance of surfaces may prevent hospital outbreaks
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Key takeaways:
- Continuous surveillance of microbes on health facility surfaces may prevent outbreaks.
- The resulting data may help identify the sources of outbreaks.
HOUSTON — A surface hygiene surveillance program could help investigators identify the source of hospital outbreaks or possibly even prevent them in the first place, according to a study.
Sam J. Watkin, PhD, a researcher at University College London, presented findings from the study during a session at ASM Microbe.
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“The main driver behind doing this research project was that the requirements on surface hygiene in clinical spaces isn’t as well characterized as things such as water quality or air,” Watkin said. “We were looking to build up evidence to support the development of surface sampling protocols to improve our infection control practice.”
For their study, Watkin and colleagues collected and cultured samples from 22 communal touch surfaces weekly for 9 weeks in a pediatric bone marrow transplant unit in London, for a total of 193 samples.
They grouped the sample sites by the people who predominantly came in contact with them — for example, patients or health care staff — and by type of site and the activities that were conducted there.
They found that clinical staff sites had the highest geometric mean aerobic colony count during the study period, specifically computer devices. The most predominant microbial colonies consisted of Micrococcus luteus and Rhizobium radiobacter
Although none of the sites were contaminated to a level or by an organism that required notifying infection control teams, Watkin said monitoring the microbial community in hospital environments carries many potential benefits.
“Pretty much all of these are routine environmental organisms or skin flora,” Watkin said. “What we really want to [do is] use this sort of information to inform where we collect samples when we monitor the environmental features in hospitals, and then use those protocols to inform ongoing risk assessments.”
For example, if testing identifies “a particular contamination pattern that often occurs within” one area, the hospital can conduct a clinical risk assessment based on that finding, Watkin said.
“So, it’s really tailoring our approach to different areas within the clinical space to improve patient safety,” he said.
Having data on the microbes populating a facility could help identify an increase in organisms of concern, allowing doctors to get ahead of an outbreak or use the data to pin down where in a facility an outbreak is occurring, he said.
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Watkin SJ, et al. How can monitoring environmental touch surfaces for microbial contaminants support infection control practice? Presented at: ASM Microbe; June 15-19, 2023; Houston.
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