Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Rethinking Contact Precautions for the Control of Endemic Drug Resistant Organisms

Should we relax contact precautions as currently practiced, particularly for the control of endemic hospital pathogens such as MRSA and VRE? 

We think so and recently published a manuscript in Current Infectious Diseases Reports arguing the above point.

Much of our argument is based on the premise of a horizontal infection control program, one in which all infections are targeted by multipotent, broad based infection prevention interventions. With this strategy, hospital acquired infections may be controlled, thus limiting the need for contact precautions, particularly for certain pathogens.

Change may be in the air.