Hospital infection prevention work

Date published: 02/10/2007

Staff at the four hospitals runs by Pennine Acute Trust have made a major impact on MRSA cases through their infection prevention work, according to the latest six-monthly figures. 

The news comes shortly after the Government announced its latest guidance on improving infection prevention, which has been welcomed by the nurse leading the Trust’s work across its four hospitals –  Rochdale Infirmary, Fairfield General Hospital in Bury, The Royal Oldham Hospital and North Manchester General Hospital.

The latest figures for the Trust show that for the six months March to August 2007 the Trust had 40 MRSA cases, compared to 54 cases over the same time period in 2006.

The figures represent a fall of 14 cases, equating to a 25 per cent reduction year-on-year.

Louise Dickinson, nurse consultant infection prevention and control said: "Staff at all levels have been working extremely hard to tackle all healthcare associated infections, and I strongly believe that the drop in the MRSA figures are a tribute to their efforts.

"It is also important to remember what these figures represent.  For MRSA, the figures include cases where patients have contracted the condition in the community, as it circulates freely. Many times, the patient has the condition before being admitted to hospital, where it is then detected. We can then get on with their treatment.

"Of course, one infection is one too many and we carry out a lot of work to minimise the chance of patients contracting any infections. This includes using hospital radio to tell patients to remind their visitors to use the hand rub which is in place on all wards. We also have many signs up and bottles of hand rub the wards, but we need everyone to play their part in helping us beat the bugs. It’s a joint effort."

Regarding C Diff, the most recent annual figures from the Health Protection Agency which set cases against the number of bed days for organisations give Pennine Acute Trust’s hospitals an average of 1.51 per thousand bed days. The figure is the lowest rate of all hospital trusts in Greater Manchester and lower than the national average of 2.39. 

The Department of Health announced recently that hospitals across the country would be required to undertake a number of measures, including ensuring that staff wear short-sleeved uniforms.

They also said that Trust Board members should be aware of the issues surrounding infection rates.

Ms Dickinson added: "Our work on the uniform issue began some time back, and is going well. We actually report our figures to each meeting of our Trust Board, through our operational report, so that information is going straight to the top – and has been for months."

Meanwhile, the Trust is currently waiting to hear the outcome of a bid for additional funding to help with more infection prevention work, as part of a national £50 million fund released by the Government.