Infection Control Matters

Turning prevalence into incidence to determine the burden of healthcare associated infections

In this week's episode, Martin Kiernan talks to Brett Mitchell about his recent paper that estimates the burden of HCAI from a prevalence study.
Papers discussed are:
Lydeamore MJ, Mitchell BG, Bucknall T, Cheng AC, Russo PL, Stewardson AJ Burden of five healthcare associated infections in Australia. Antimicrob Resist Infect Control 2022; 11: 69. https://aricjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13756-022-01109-8
Russo PL, Stewardson AJ, Cheng AC, Bucknall T, Mitchell BG The prevalence of healthcare associated infections among adult inpatients at nineteen large Australian acute-care public hospitals: a point prevalence survey. Antimicrob Resist Infect Control 2019; 8: 114. https://aricjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13756-019-0570-y

Are we experts? Phil, Brett and Martin mull this over

This week's podcast is a live chat recorded in Melbourne in June and features Phil Russo, Brett Mitchell and Martin Kiernan, who discuss whether we think that we are IPC experts (or not). Have a listen and make your own mind up!

Arrival of Monkeypox and will transmission paradigms change post-COVID? With Dr Deb Friedman

A/Professor Deb Friedman is the Deputy Chief Health Officer at the Department of Health Victoria,  Australia. Prior to that she was the Medical Director of infection prevention control and response in Victoria, a key role in Victorias covid response. With an extensive history in infection prevention and control as an infectious diseases  physician Deb has played a vital role in Victoria's COVID response. In this episode, Phil Russo chats to her about her role as DCHO and her recent involvement with the arrival of monkey pox.  With her great insight Deb also shares her  views about the airborne v droplet paradigm.

The New Zealand National Point Prevalance Study with Dr Sally Roberts

In this podcast Phil Russo chats with Dr Sally Roberts, Clinical Head of Microbiology at the Auckland District Health Board, Aotearoa New Zealand. She is also the National Clinical Lead  for the Health Quality & Safety Commission New Zealand Infection Prevention and Control programme and recently led the recent first national point prevalent survey of healthcare associated infections across Aotearoa New Zealand. Sally tells us what led to the first ever PPS in Aotearoa New Zealand, the many challenges they endured, the major findings and how the data will be used nationally. A publication is in the making, in the meantime you can read the full Aotearoa New Zealand Health Safety and Quality report here.

I-DECIDED tool

In this podcast, Brett talks to Dr Gillian Ray-Barruel from the University of Queensland and Griffith University. We talk about Gillian's development of the I-DECIDED tool - decision tool for assessment and management of all invasive devices in the hospital setting.
In the podcast, Gillian mentioned she was happy to be contacted.
The link to the paper can be found here: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35439078/
 

Using whole genome sequencing as part of an infection control service

In this podcast, Martin and Brett talk to Trish Hurst, Belinda Henderson and Dr Patrick Harris about how WGS is being used in two major Australian hospitals. We here about how it started, how is works now and the potential of WGS in real-time for infection control services.
The discussion is centred around this pre-print publication: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.05.02.22273921v1 "Clinical implementation of routine whole-genome sequencing for hospital infection control of multi-drug resistant pathogens"

What affects environmental contamination with C. difficile? New papers with Dr David Weber

In this week's episode, Martin Kiernan talks to Dr David Weber, Professor of Medicine, Pediatrics and Epidemiology at the University of North Carolina about recent papers on environmental contamination with Clostridioides difficile. We discuss antibiotics and the effect of asymptomatic carriage on risk of transmission. The papers we discuss are:
Warren BG, et al. The Impact of Infection Versus Colonization on Clostridioides difficile Environmental Contamination in Hospitalized Patients With Diarrhea. Open Forum Infect Dis. 2022;9(4):ofac069.  https://doi:10.1093/ofid/ofac069
Turner NA, et al. Impact of Oral Metronidazole, Vancomycin, and Fidaxomicin on Host Shedding and Environmental Contamination With Clostridioides difficile. Clin Infect Dis. 2022;74(4):648-656.  https://doi:10.1093/cid/ciab473

Respiratory protection preparedness in critical care healthcare workers & facial hair

In this podcast, Brett Mitchell talks to Professor Daryl Williams about respirators and facial hair. So much to learn, so much more to know. The talk was based on a paper published in Infection Disease and Health.
The article link: https://www.idhjournal.com.au/article/S2468-0451(22)00003-7/fulltext
Prof Daryl Williams is the Director of the Department of Anaesthesia and Pain Management. His clinical and research interests include neuro-anaesthesia, resuscitation, trauma medicine and advanced airway management.

Reflecting on a contact precautions talk at ECCMID with Dr Gonzalo Bearman

After his excellent session atthe ECCMID meeting, Martin talks to Dr Gonzalo Bearman (Chief of Infectious Diseases at VCU Health, Editor in Chief of Antimicrobial Stewardship Healthcare Epidemiology (ASHE), footballer and drummer) about the removal of contact precautions for endemic organisms like MRSA and VRE and how evidence can change practice. Challenges of applying evidence from one setting to another are also discussed. Some of Gonzalo's papers on this subject are here:
Bearman GM, et al. A controlled trial of universal gloving versus contact precautions for preventing the transmission of multidrug-resistant organisms. Am J Infect Control. 2007;35(10):650-655.  https://10.1016/j.ajic.2007.02.011
McLemore A, et al. Effect of contact precautions on wait time from emergency room disposition to inpatient admission. Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol. 2011;32(3):298-299.  https://doi:10.1086/658913
Banach DB, et al. Duration of Contact Precautions for Acute-Care Settings. Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol. 2018:1-18.  https://doi:10.1017/ice.2017.245
Bearman G, et al. Impact of Discontinuing Contact Precautions for Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus and Vancomycin-Resistant Enterococcus: An Interrupted Time Series Analysis. Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol. 2018;39(6):676-682.  https://doi:10.1017/ice.2018.57
Godbout EJ, et al. Impact of discontinuation of contact precautions on central-line associated bloodstream infections in an academic children's hospital. Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol. 2019:1-3. 
Haessler S, et al. Stopping the routine use of contact precautions for management of MRSA and VRE at three academic medical centers: An interrupted time series analysis. Am J Infect Control. 2020;48(12):1466-1473.  https://doi:10.1016/j.ajic.2020.06.219
Morgan DJ, et al. Contact Precautions for Endemic MRSA and VRE: Time to Retire Legal Mandates. JAMA. 2017;318(4):329-330.  https://doi:10.1001/jama.2017.7419
Bearman G, et al. Control of drug-resistant pathogens in endemic settings: contact precautions, controversies, and a proposal for a less restrictive alternative. Curr Infect Dis Rep. 2012;14(6):620-626.  https://doi:10.1007/s11908-012-0299-8

Environmental cleaning & the role of patient service assistants

In this podcast, Brett Mitchell talks to A/Professor Stéphane Bouchoucha about a recent article exploring the role of patient service assistants in environmental cleaning. The article is published in Infection Disease and Health. https://www.idhjournal.com.au/article/S2468-0451(22)00006-2/fulltext
Dr Stéphane Bouchoucha is an Associate Professor and Associate Head of School (International) in the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Deakin University. He is also a researcher based in Deakin’s Institute for Health Transformation and the Australasian College for Infection Prevention and Control President-Elect.