The Journal of hospital infection
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Multicenter Study
Risk factors for Pseudomonas aeruginosa acquisition in intensive care units: a prospective multicentre study.
Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a major nosocomial pathogen in intensive care units (ICUs); however, endogenous versus exogenous origin of contamination remains unclear. ⋯ Individual risk factors and environmental factors for which intervention is possible were identified for P. aeruginosa acquisition.
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Several studies have shown that rubbing hands with an alcohol/chlorhexidine solution provides equivalent microbial decontamination to a conventional surgical scrub using aqueous chlorhexidine. However, the authors believe that these studies have methodological flaws that limit their applicability to the operating theatre environment. As such, a method was developed to compare products in an everyday operating theatre environment using working operating theatre personnel. ⋯ An alcohol/chlorhexidine hand rub was found to be as efficacious as a traditional scrub after 30 min; this study differs from previous work as it was undertaken in a population of practising anaesthetists in their working environment. The McKenzie method allows baseline and study evaluations to be performed contemporaneously on the same individual. Each subject was his/her own control. This method offers a more clinically relevant way to compare disinfectant solutions than standard methods.