C. difficile spore removal via hand washing remains a challenge

A range of antimicrobial and non-antimicrobial hand wash products yielded similarly unimpressive results in removing Clostridium difficile, according to data presented at The 2009 Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America Annual Meeting, held in San Diego.

Dale Gerding, MD, of the Edward Hines, Jr. Veterans Administration Hospital tested numerous products on test participants who had C. difficile spores on their palms. A minimum of three participants for each product performed a 15-second hand wash followed by a 15-second rinse.

Washing with tap water alone achieved a log₁₀ reduction in C. difficile spores of 0.76. A 4% chlorhexadine antimicrobial hand wash yielded 0.77 reduction, a non-antimicrobial hand wash yielded a 0.78 reduction, a non-antimicrobial body wash yielded a 0.86 reduction and a 0.3% triclosan antimicrobial hand wash yielded a 0.99 reduction.

A heavy duty hand cleaner used for instances of extreme contamination was used as a control. That product achieved a log₁₀ reduction of 1.21.

Gerding commented on these results.

“It is unlikely that the heavy duty cleaner will be approved for use in a health care setting, so we can all but eliminate that as a possible option,” Gerding said. “That leaves us with products that are unable to remove more than 90% of spores. In other words, if you have a million spores on your hand, you are going to have 100,000 left even after using the strictest hand washing procedures.” – by Rob Volansky

For more information:

Gerding D. #43 Presented at: Annual Meeting of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America; March 19-22, 2009; San Diego.