Keyboards And Mice Can Harbor Hospital Infections

[steven johnson]

Desks in offices are more contaminated with bacteria than toilet seats. It appears that the concern has been extended to hospitals. The average desk harbors 400 times more bacteria than the average toilet seat. Computers have large bacterial loads in offices.

http://www.disinfecttoprotect.com/downloads/Office-Study.pdf

Although hospital computer equipment can act as a reservoir for pathogenic organisms, including MRSA, researchers writing in the open access journal BMC Infectious Diseases found that bacterial contamination rates from computer equipment were low, possibly as the result of good hand hygiene.

Yen-hsu Chen, from Kaohsiung Medical University Hospital, Taiwan, led a team of researchers who studied IT equipment in a 1600-bed medical center in southern Taiwan with 47 wards and 282 computers. He said: "Most hospital computer devices are not waterproof, or otherwise designed for disinfection needs. Clinically, A. baumannii, P. aeruginosa, and MRSA cause the most common nosocomial infections, and their presence correlates with environmental surface contamination. We screened 282 computer stations, looking for these bacteria and other, less dangerous, species."

The results revealed a 17.4% (49/282) contamination rate of S. aureus, Acinetobacter spp. or Pseudomonas spp. The contamination rates of MRSA and A. baumannii in the ward computers were 1.1% and 4.3%, respectively. No P. aeruginosa was found. According to Chen, "No clinical correlation of contamination of these computer devices to clinical isolates was found. Routine disinfection and even surveillance of these computer devices may not be mandatory in non-outbreak settings."

Keyboards And Mice Can Harbor Hospital Infections

[madrchsod]

1. simple-wipe them with red tops before logging on.

when someone in our house is sick we wipe everything with red tops several times a day.

[xchrom]

2. just when you thought it was safe to log on. nt