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Infection Prevention: The Past Is Prelude
Looking to the past and the present, Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) President Karen Hoffmann, RN, MS, CIC, FSHEA, FAPIC, recently gave a keynote address in Philadelphia at the annual APIC conference. Hoffman also is an infection prevention consultant for the Survey and Certification Group at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and a clinical instructor in the division of infectious diseases at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine.
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FDA Alert: Fatal Infection Following Fecal Transplant
Multidrug-resistant organisms are infecting new patients via transplantation, putting recipients at risk of infections and threatening to spur larger hospital outbreaks. Two recently reported incidents underscore the threat, with one described in an alert by the FDA about fecal microbiota transplantation to treat Clostridioides difficile infections.
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FDA: Hospitals Could Face Shortages of Sterile Supplies
The emission of ethylene oxide from sterilization facilities into surrounding communities has raised cancer concerns, warnings, and closures that threaten the critical flow of sterile supplies in healthcare, the FDA reports. Infection preventionists should keep communication channels open with central sterile supply and other key colleagues to ensure spot shortages of equipment do not pose a threat to patient safety.
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Meeting the Challenge of Sterilizing Duodenoscopes
Infection preventionists and central sterile supply technicians must work together to protect patients from duodenoscopes that could remain contaminated after reprocessing. That is the take-home message from a comprehensive program that shows it can be done.
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Widespread Boarding of Pediatric Psychiatric Patients Raises Concerns
It is difficult to imagine a child with a medical emergency staying in an ED for several days waiting for an inpatient bed. Yet, it happens routinely to children and adolescents with psychiatric emergencies.
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Early Documentation of End-of-Life Wishes Linked to Better Outcomes
Careful and early charting of a hospice patient’s end-of-life wishes reduces the chance of an unwanted hospitalization, according to the results of a recent investigation.
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Ethical Education on Mechanical Circulatory Support Lacking
Modern life-sustaining therapies pose some complex ethical questions. Still, most residency and fellowship programs do not address the ethics of these interventions specifically.
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When Is It Appropriate to Admit End-of-Life Patients to ICU?
ICU admission should be based on the alignment of uniquely beneficial treatment offered by the ICU, along with patients’ values and stated goals of care, the authors of a recent paper argued.