• Allyson Lipp, Cheryl Phillips, Paul Harris, and Iwan Dowie.
• Faculty of Health, Sport and Science, Department of Care Sciences, University of South Wales, Glyn Taff Campus, Pontypridd, Rhondda Cynon Taff, UK, CF37 1DL.
• Cochrane Db Syst Rev. 2013 Jan 1;8:CD008062.

BackgroundSurgical site infections (i.e. incisions that become infected) are a continuing concern in health care. Microbial sealant is a liquid that can be applied to the skin immediately before surgery and is thought to help reduce the incidence of surgical site infections (SSIs) by sealing in the skin flora, thus preventing contamination and infection of the surgical site.ObjectivesTo assess the effects of the preoperative application of microbial sealants (compared with no microbial sealant) on rates of SSI in people undergoing clean surgery.Search MethodsFor this first update we searched the following electronic databases in July 2013: the Cochrane Wounds Group Specialised Register, the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), Ovid MEDLINE, Ovid MEDLINE - In-Process & Other Non-Indexed Citations, Ovid EMBASE and EBSCO CINAHL.Selection CriteriaRandomised controlled trials (RCTs) were eligible for inclusion if they involved people undergoing clean surgery (i.e. surgery that does not involve the breathing system, gut, genital or urinary tract or any part of the body with an existing infection) in an operating theatre and compared the use of preoperative microbial sealants with no microbial sealant.Data Collection And AnalysisAll review authors independently extracted data on the characteristics, risk of bias and outcomes of the eligible trials.Main ResultsThree trials (524 participants undergoing clean surgery) met the inclusion criteria. The trials all compared cyanoacrylate microbial sealant with no sealant, and, when pooled, we found there were fewer SSIs with the use of microbial sealant (10/261 participants) than with the control comparison (29/274 participants). The difference between the two groups was statistically significant (risk ratio (RR) 0.36, 95% CI 0.18 to 0.72) but given the number of participants and quality of the studies, they should be treated with caution. There were some adverse events in one study, but these were not judged to be a result of the use of microbial sealant.Authors' ConclusionsIn this first update there is still insufficient evidence available to determine whether the use of microbial sealants reduces the risk of surgical site infection or not. Further rigorous, adequately-powered RCTs are required to investigate this properly.

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