VIDEO: Using a team-based approach to reduce C. auris
ORLANDO — In this video, Emily N. Gaddam, RN, BSN, CIC, MHDS, a nurse epidemiologist at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, explains how the facility uses a team-based approach to reduce the spread of Candida auris.
Gaddam presented findings from a study at the annual conference of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology that showed how the hospital was able to use a PCR test developed in its microbiology lab to improve C. auris surveillance and detection.
The approach focuses on three steps: “identify, isolate and inform,” Gaddam said.
“One of the major issues with C. auris is that many institutions never had a way to identify which patients had C. auris because there’s no ... readily available screening test,” Gaddam told Healio. “We’re lucky to have [enough resources] that our microbiology lab was able to develop a new test that we could screen with.”
Reference:
- Gaddam EN, et al. Candida auris: A team-based approach to taming the wild yeast. Presented at: APIC 2023; June 26-28, 2023; Orlando.
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