Health. Care. | An Educational Blog

Infection prevention and control is a challenging field. There is the long training and certification process. There are the long hours of on-the-job training and specialization. There are the mountains and mountains of paperwork alongside the demanding clinical work. Some might even say it’s a thankless job, with tons of pressure to improve, alongside an ever-changing landscape of pathogens and patient populations. And yet there continues to be a group of passionate individuals who choose to make a difference by becoming infection preventionists. Today we take a moment to say thank you to all those students of infection control, the future professionals in IC/IP.

In a widely-circulated interview, President Biden stated that the pandemic was, in effect, over. While not an official statement and also clarified over the next few days, the idea that the worst of the pandemic is over has been echoed by global medical experts. So what now? A return to "normal" in the medical field does not mean no more infections; in fact, it means returning to a world where almost 100,000 people die each year from infections they acquired while receiving medical care - most of which are preventable. There are many similarities between a pandemic and the on-going crisis of hospital-acquired infections, and in today's post, we will explore them. 

No one wants to stay in a hospital any longer than they have to. We all have an innate desire to get back to the comfort of our homes and begin the process of returning to normal activities. Some of us may not realize that there is also a very real, scientific reason for leaving the hospital as soon as possible: The longer a patient is in the hospital, the greater their chances of getting a hospital-associated infection (HAI), and once a patient has an HAI, they tend to stay longer in the hospital. It seems like a lose-lose scenario for everyone involved. It's just in everybody's best interest to reduce HAIs to not increase LOS, and shorten LOS to reduce HAIs. In today's post, we'll see how healthcare facilities are working to accomplish this dual goal.

Nursing responsibilities have changed dramatically over the past decades. While some non-medical tasks have been shifted to other workers, additional administrative responsibilities have been added. As a result, nursing is among the top most stressful jobs in our country, made all the more challenging during the pandemic. What happens when nurses feel pressured by time constraints? What can be done to alleviate this pressure? We will look at options in today's post.

The general public has never been more aware of handwashing, thanks to the COVID pandemic. We all got a glimpse into the world of the healthcare worker as we washed our hands or used hand sanitizer every time we left a store or got home. Healthcare workers live this life daily, with protocols set to remind them to take every handwashing opportunity in an effort to protect patients (and themselves) from disease. In today's post, we will explore how the pandemic impacted hand washing, called hand hygiene, during the pandemic and beyond. Did the pandemic increase or decrease hand hygiene?

Think back to the last time you or a loved one was a patient in a hospital or healthcare facility. What things do you remember most? Is it the stress about health and recovery? Maybe you remember the frustration of trying to get answers or understanding what was going on? Or perhaps you remember a constant worry about whether the hospital was clean enough to prevent an infection? If any or all of these are familiar, you are not alone. A recent study investigated what patients consider the most important aspects of a quality hospital, and as this post will reveal, how infection prevention is their top concern.

Overbed tables are essential in patient rooms. They serve as a surface for food trays, and can hold personal items such as phones, computers, or books. Even healthcare workers uses overbed tables for holding medical devices or supplies. All this usage means one thing: Overbed tables are one of the most-touched and most-contaminated surfaces in a patient room.

In Washington, a panel is meeting to discuss the future of the US Public Health System. Public health systems came under increased scrutiny during the COVID pandemic, spurring the panel to convene and  determine ways to make the system more efficient and effective. This is no simple task. The public health system is a network of public, private, and voluntary agencies whose shared goal of community well-being belie the complicated structure and organization behind them. In today's post, we'll take a closer look at the goals of public health, the entities that make up the public health system, and the way they intersect with hospital infection control.

Today's hospital beds are a product of 1800s innovation, steadily improving with each decade's advancements in health care, engineering, and technology. Patient beds today not only provide a place for rest and recuperation, they can actually improve patient outcomes and prevent medical complications. In today's post, we'll look at some of those improvements and suggest directions for the future.

In last week's post, we explored the overlap between architectural principles in the AIA's Framework for Design Excellence. Today, we will look at the foundational components of architectural design and how they overlap with designing with infection control in mind.