Becker's Clinical Quality & Infection Control

24 INFECTION CONTROL & PATIENT SAFETY Ditch the Flowers and Balloons: Why Hospitals Want Families to Leave Gifts at Home By Morgan Haefner M any hospitals are modifying their visiting polices to restrict get-well items gied to patients, according to the Wall Street Journal. Although ICUs have banned items like flowers for decades, similar bans are trickling down to some ICU step-down units, cardiac care units, and pediatric, labor and delivery units, among others. Bans are established to limit the spread of infection and reduce patient harm, though sometimes the links between the items and their harm are not solidified, according to the Wall Street Journal. What is and isn't banned varies among each hospital's visitor policies, so guests are best positioned to do their research before arriving on the hospital campus with gis in hand. Here are five items increasingly banned in some healthcare facilities: 1. Flowers and plants are restricted in some hospitals based on recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Preven- tion to protect immunosuppressive patients, given plants' potential to grow mold. How- ever, the CDC states that "minimal or no evidence indicates that the presence of plants in immunocompetent patient-care areas pos- es an increased risk of healthcare–associated infection," according to the Guidelines for Environmental Infection Control in Health- Care Facilities. e CDC also recommends healthcare workers administering patient care re- frain from handling flowers. Pollen can stick to a healthcare worker's clothes and be transferred to patients who are allergic to it, according to the Wall Street Journal. Hospitals that specialize in organ transplants may enforce stricter rules about flowers than smaller hospitals. Flowers and spilled water from the vase can also hinder access to patients in emergency situations. Further, the vase can sometimes be used by a patient to inflict self-harm, according to the report. 2. Balloons, especially those made of latex, can trigger allergic reactions. is safety con- cern has caused many hospitals to ban them altogether. For example, NewYork-Presby- terian Hospital has a ban on all latex and Mylar balloons. (Mylar is a synthetic metal). Balloons pose another risk: their strings can get caught in equipment like IV poles and hinder easy access to the patient. Balloon strings are also something psychiatric pa- tients can use to inflict self-harm, according to the report. 3. Cellphones are restricted for many rea- sons, including fear of electromagnetic wave interference with medical equipment. How- ever, there is little evidence of this threat, according to the Wall Street Journal. Cellphones are sometimes banned to prevent noisiness, tripping hazards when attached to chargers, WiFi draining and distraction. Cellphones also carry 10 times more bacteria than what is found on most toilet seats, according to a 2012 University of Arizona study. Hospital policies related to cell phones vary. Most restrictions apply to the ICU. 4. Stuffed animals can cause harm if their attached eyes, noses, beads or buttons fall off and get into the hands of young patients, who may swallow them. 5. Food can be banned from facilities in an effort to keep patients who suffer from food allergies and dietary restrictions safe, according to the report. Children's hospitals are especially unlikely to allow food unless a nursing supervisor has approved. n Researchers Identify Effective New MRSA Decolonization Protocol By Shannon Barnet A lthough decolonization is an important part of managing methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infections, the process takes longer than the average hospital length of stay. To prevent incomplete decolonization, researchers have tested a new program that extends to outpatient and home settings. Their study was published in the journal Antimicrobial Re- sistance and Infection Control. It focuses on the integrated MRSA management model, which continues decoloniza- tion efforts beyond discharge to long-term care facilities or to patients' homes. The IMM protocol uses polyhexa- nide-based products to combat MRSA. Highlighted below are three findings from the study. 1. The overall decolonization rate was much higher (47 percent) in the IMM patient group than in the control group (12 percent). 2. The post-discharge treatment was as effective as treat- ment completed during hospitalization, with microbiolog- ically confirmed decolonization rates of 55 percent for the IMM group and 43 percent for the control group. 3. Among all patients with skin wounds or entry sites who finished the complete decolonization protocol regardless of their location, decolonization was successful 50 percent of the time when skin alterations were MRSA-negative at the baseline, compared to 22 percent of the time for patients with skin alterations that were MRSA-positive at the baseline. "IMM is a promising concept to improve decolonization rates of MRSA-carriers for patients who leave the hospital before decolonization is completed," the study authors concluded. n

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