Infection prevention and control in your LTCF: Webinar recap

The numbers are daunting. As many as 3 million serious infections occur each year in long-term care facilities (LTCFs)¹, and approximately 380,000 residents die from them.² These conditions can include urinary tract infections, C. difficile, MRSA, multidrug-resistant infections and others, and can cause death in LTCFs.³

In a webinar titled “Evidence-Based Strategies for Infection Prevention and Control in Long Term Care” for McKnight’s Long-Term Care News, Nikki Cracknell, MS, RN, Medline Senior Manager of Clinical Development and Medical Science Liaison in Medical Affairs, talks about the risks, their significance and how they occur. She also shares evidence-based infection prevention and control best practices to help keep people safe.

More than 1.2 million Americans live in nursing homes, and more than 800,000 live in assisted-living facilities.⁴ When people—many of them with compromised immune systems—are living this close together, they’re more likely to pick up infections that are transmitted from person to person or through cross-contamination in their surroundings.

C. diff and other multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs)—organisms that can’t easily be killed by antibiotics—are a prevalent problem and can cause many of these infections. In fact, 64 percent of nursing home residents harbor at least one MDRO.⁵

It’s hard to believe, but approximately 80 percent of all infections are transmitted by hand⁶, yet about 60 percent of healthcare workers don’t adequately wash theirs.⁷ We can minimize infection by getting back to something as simple but important as practicing good hand hygiene. This means:

• Clean hands for at least 20 seconds using at least 60 percent alcohol-based hand rub (ABHR) when working with patients or residents.⁸
• Wash hands for at least 20 seconds with soap and water when hands are visibly dirty, before eating, after using the restroom, and after caring for people with infectious diarrhea.⁸
• Place soap and ABHR dispensers throughout facilities.

• Have a designated infection preventionist and multidisciplinary oversight team to detect, treat, contain and prevent transmission.
• Implement outbreak control measures as soon as possible.
• Use antimicrobial ointments (mupirocin or PVP-I) and body washes (chlorhexidine gluconate) to prevent healthcare-associated infections.
• Select cleaning products specifically formulated and EPA-registered to kill some of the most contagious and hard-to-kill pathogens.
• Have clear messaging and policies for hand hygiene and other basic practices.
• Invest in ongoing training and education so that clinical and professional cleaning staff understand the important role they play in infection prevention and use best practices.
• Have protocols for transferring residents to and from facilities.