infection control practices

(MedPage Today) -- Infection control practices to prevent various hospital-acquired infections are being more frequently used, both at nonfederal and VA hospitals, researchers found.

(Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America) Scientists at the Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center found that an emphasis on compliance with non-pathogen specific infection control practices such as hand hygiene, efforts to reduce device-related infections and chlorhexidine bathing (a daily bath with the same antibacterial agent used by surgeons to "scrub in" before an operation), is successful in reducing rates of health-care-associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus.

TORONTO (MedPage Today) -- Early evidence suggests that healthcare workers are not over-represented among those who have come down with the H1N1 flu, the CDC said, but that they may not have been vigilant about infection control practices.