Becker's Clinical Quality & Infection Control

41 Executive Briefing Founded by epidemiologists Dr. Julie Stachowiak and Dr. Mark Stibich, Xenex's mission is to save lives and reduce suffering by destroying the deadly microorganisms that can cause hospital acquired infections (HAIs). Xenex's pulsed xenon Full Spectrum™ UV disinfection system reduces the bacterial load often associated with an increased risk for HAIs. Xenex Germ-Zapping RobotsTM are included in infection prevention protocols in more than 300 hospitals, skilled nursing facilities and surgery centers throughout the U.S., Canada, Africa and Europe. The Xenex robot is the only UV disinfection technology that has been shown, in multiple peer-reviewed published studies, to help hospitals reduce HAI rates – with hospitals reporting greater than 50 percent reductions in C.diff, MRSA and Surgical Site Infection (SSI) rates. Designed for ease of use and portability, a hospital's environmental services (EVS) staff can operate the Xenex device without disrupting hospital operations. The Xenex system is being used in every unit within hospitals – including isolation rooms, operating rooms (ORs), emergency departments, bathrooms and public spaces. Due to its speed (5-minute disinfection cycles with no warm-up or cool down time) and ease of use, the Xenex system has proven to integrate smoothly into hospital cleaning operations and HAI rate reduction strategies. In this capacity too, Xenex has proven itself effective time and time again. Hospitals that have reaped the rewards from pulsed xenon robots "I don't want to play favorites, but there is one product — Xenex — that is clearly proving itself on the market over and over and over again," says Mr. Miller. "I don't know how you would do the inverse math because there are more than 50 companies that make UV products and only one published peer-reviewed infection rate reduction study between all of them to support the efficacy of mercury bulb devices. And then there is one UV device that uses pulsed xenon that has seven peer-reviewed published studies proving its effectiveness on decreasing HAI rates." South Seminole Hospital in Longwood, Fla., is just one facility that has seen the infection-reducing power of Xenex devices first-hand. South Seminole, which is part of Orlando (Fla.) Health, began using Xenex- manufactured pulsed xenon UV robots in 2012. During the first year South Seminole began using the UV robots, from 2012 to 2013, the hospital saw a 47 percent reduction in hospital-acquired C. diff. During that same time period, the community-acquired rate of C. diff actually increased by 7 percent. "The concern with numbers like these is always wondering if it's a fluke and if the improvement is sustainable, but we're actually seeing ongoing improvement since 2013," Thomas Kelley, MD, chief of quality and clinical transformation at Orlando Health, told Becker's in October. "For instance, from 2012 to 2014, we actually decreased the C. diff rate in the facility by 57 percent." South Seminole Hospital saw the same pattern emerge for other stubborn HAIs — MRSA decreased by 30 percent and VRE rates decreased by 50 percent since adding the pulsed xenon robots. South Seminole served as the pilot hospital for Orlando Health's trial with UV disinfection, but in January of this year, the system implemented the pulsed xenon UV robot system in its other hospitals as well. Thus far, the system has seen positive results at the other facilities, including the system's flagship Orlando Regional Medical Center, which had not seen major improvements in its infection rates in the three years prior to adding the system. Over the first five months after implementing the UV robots, ORMC saw a 25 percent reduction in C. diff and VRE and a 35 percent reduction in MRSA infections. In addition to improving patient care by reducing these infections, Orlando Health projected the disinfection robots would save the entire health system $23 million over a five-year span, based on the results at South Seminole Hospital, according to Dr. Kelley. The findings at South Seminole and ORMC are not isolated incidents. In November, Trinity Medical Center in Birmingham, Ala., published a study in the American Journal of Infection Control showing surgical site infections for patients undergoing total knee and total hip replacements dropped to zero after the hospital implemented quality improvement initiatives and pulsed xenon UV light disinfection. Before implementing the two-pronged infection control bundle, the hospital had four SSIs reported from 200 total hip procedures, and three SSIs from 191 total knee procedures. After the bundle was fully implemented, no SSIs were reported from 191 total hip procedures or from 394 total knee procedures. Additionally, the hospital reported a savings of $290,990 over 12 months. The infection control outcomes and cost savings seen at these hospitals may seem too good to be true, but they are reproduced to some degree at every institution that implements pulsed xenon UV light disinfection. "Xenex pays for itself within a few months. It's good for the patient. It's good for the hospital's bottom line. It's good for the public in general. And sure, it's good for Xenex, but we feel very strongly that there is no question that using pulsed xenon is truly the right thing to do," says Mr. Miller.

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