Guide to Hospital Acquired Infections Brought to You by The MATER PRIVATE HOSPITAL.
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In Ireland, hospitals are required to cumulate data on blood stream infections and reportable infections such as salmonella and C difficile.
If you would like to learn about these hospital infections, and to see data relating to the incidence of hospital infections, please go to the hpsc website (hpsc.ie) or the HIQA website for rates of infections by hospital.
Infection rates in private hospitals
According to Bupa Insurance, access to cleaner hospitals is now why sixty five percent of people are taking out medical insurance. Certainly, treatment in a private hospital or clinic significantly reduces a patient's chance of contracting a hospital acquired infection.
Independent hospitals have lower bed occupancy, nursing staff are under less pressure and patients mostly have their own private rooms with en-suite bathrooms so the risk of cross-infection is substantially reduced. Furthermore, in independent hospitals a higher nurse-to-patient ratio ensures a higher quality of care, and with more staff resources private hospitals can operate a thorough room cleaning system.
Private hospitals can also afford a robust infection surveillance programme and ongoing staff training so that the medical team does their utmost to minimise infections. Private hospitals are able to carry out effective isolation procedures if they find a patient is an MRSA carrier.
Hospital infection rates abroad
With MRSA rates in our Irish hospitals among the worst in Europe it is not surprising that many patients who are financially able are opting for private healthcare abroad because infection rates are lower, and in some cases non-existent and private treatment is competitively priced even with the cost of flights, hotels and transportation.
There is plenty of speculation about why Ireland has more MRSA infections than Europe but it is thought that strains spread more easily in Ireland than abroad due to the high levels of bed occupancy, the rapid turnover of patients and short staffing which leads to employing temporary staff who may not be as well briefed on infection control. Our hospitals are run to full capacity in an attempt to reduce waiting lists, and with so much pressure on space and few single rooms, it is near impossible to isolate infected staff, so infections can spread more easily.
- Hospitals in Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands and Denmark have proved it is possible to avoid infections reaching the blood of their patients due to having more isolation facilities and lower bed occupancy.
- In the Netherlands for example patients at increase risk of MRSA are admitted to single rooms and screened for MRSA. If they are found to be positive, they are treated with antibiotic cream, showers etc. until found to have s negative screens. The Mater Private practices this process of ‘seal and destroy’ and have successfully reduced MRSA blood infections to zero in the pat 3 years.
- But that is not to say that other countries aren't affected by HAIs. The European Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance System (EARSS), which monitors antimicrobial resistance in Europe shows that other countries also have a high proportion of SA infections which are methicillin-resistant. Greece, for example, records 48.6 percent, while Germany and Spain record 20 per cent but Norway recorded less than 0.6% MRSA in 2005. EARSS maintains a comprehensive surveillance and information system that provides comparable and validated data on the prevalence and spread of major invasive bacteria like MRSA. EARSS data covering period 1999-2004.
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