HomeHospital Medicine
Hospital Medicine
Aggressive warming in surgery does not cut complications – PROTECT trial
Patients kept at a body temperature of 37°C during major surgery had no fewer cardiac complications than patients kept at 35.5°C, according to recent...
Standardisation needed of newborn bathing practices at US hospitals
A first nationwide survey of American hospitals has revealed a wide variety of approaches to newborn skincare, including the timing of the first bath,...
Drug resistance linked to antibiotic use and patient transfers in hospitals
The use of the penicillin antibiotic, piperacillin-tazobactam, was the strongest predictor of the emergence of bacteria that are resistant to the standard treatments for...
Hospital infections: 2-year ICU study again makes the case for copper
There are some 90,ooo infection related deaths in US hospitals each year. A growing chorus of researchers argue that replacing stainless steel surfaces with...
New CDC guidelines for S aureus prevention and control in NICUs
The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued new recommendations for the prevention and control of Staphylococcus aureus in neonatal intensive...
Injections 2.5x safer when nurses use revamped guidelines
When UK nurses followed modified guidelines that present the same information in a more user-friendly way, nearly two and half times more doses were...
Beware false negative PCR tests, warns Groote Schuur doctor
Clinicians should be wary of false negative COVID-19 PCR swab tests and rather rely on typical infection symptoms, backed by radiological scans. This warning...
'Prehab' before surgery improves care, reduces costs
"Pre-habilitation," as it's called, uses the weeks before surgery to encourage patients to move more, eat healthier, cut back on tobacco, breathe deeper, reduce...
Copper beds in ICU significantly reduce bacterial infections
A study has found that copper hospital beds in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) harboured an average of 95% fewer bacteria than conventional hospital...
High number of older adults re-admitted to hospital with pre-existing infections
Too many older adults readmitted to hospitals with same infections they took home. However, a University of Michigan study found that a disproportionately high...
Energy-saver washing machines may fail to eradicate pathogens
Repeated Klebsiella oxytoca contamination on the skin of premature babies in a German hospital's neonatal intensive care unit was eventually traced to the inability...
Poor doctor-nurse communication behind most catheter use problems
Indwelling devices like catheters cause roughly 25% of hospital infections, but ongoing efforts to reduce catheter use and misuse haven't succeeded as much as...
Flying insects and spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in hospitals
More than 50% of bacteria recovered from flying insects in a group of English hospitals were resistant to one or more antibiotics, posing a...
Anti-bacterial coating for intravascular catheters
Brown University researchers have developed a new antibacterial coating for intravascular catheters that could help to prevent catheter-related bloodstream infections, the most common type...
Remodulating hospital microbiota cuts infections and costs
The spread of antimicrobial resistance in hospitals can be limited by sanitation methods that re-modulate the hospital microbiota, according to a multi-centre trial conducted...
Fewer registered nurses linked to increased mortality risk in wards
Admission to a hospital ward with below average numbers of fully trained (registered) nurses to care for patients is linked to a 3% rise...
C. difficile on bed sheets may survive hospital laundering
Washing contaminated hospital bedsheets in a commercial washing machine with industrial detergent at high disinfecting temperatures failed to remove all traces of Clostridium difficile...
Diagnosis and treatment guidelines for C.difficile in new-borns
New-borns require special diagnosis and treatment considerations for the infectious diarrhoea Clostridioides difficile (C. difficile) infection, according to a new evidence-based white paper. The...
Palliative care associated with shorter hospital stays and lower costs
Palliative care – which better aligns medical treatments with patients' goals and wishes, aggressively treats distressing symptoms, and improves care coordination – is associated...
Significant risks to the use of short-term PICC
A US study finds that one in every four times a PICC is inserted to intravenuously deliver medicine or nutrition, the patient didn't need...
Midwives mean fewer obstetric procedures
A US hospital study found that midwife-attended births have lower use of caesareans and episiotomies among low-risk women, raising the possibility of improving value...
Cutting weekend allied health services has little effect on patients' outcomes
Removing weekend allied health services - including physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, dietetics, and social work - from the surgical wards of hospitals...
When surgical infection control practices work best
Infection control practices that focus on perioperative patient skin and wound hygiene, as well as transparent display of data, not operating room attire policies,...
Reducing US hospital readmission not increasing death rates
Reducing US hospital readmission rates for three key medical conditions occurred without causing an increase in death rates, according to a Yale University-led study.
US...
Infection spreads despite practising perfect hand hygiene
Even if hospital workers practise theoretically perfect hand hygiene, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) can still spread among babies in a neonatal intensive care unit...
Pre-surgery coaching cuts hospital stay, costs
A US study found that advance basic fitness and wellness coaching could reduce a surgical patient's average hospital stay two days, when compared to...
ICU may not be better for COPD, heart failure and heart attack
Stay in the intensive care unit may not give patients a better chance of surviving chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), heart failure or even...
Hospital-led interventions slash caesarean delivery rates
A US study found that hospital-led interventions over a seven-year period were associated with a significant reduction in the caesarean delivery rate.
Nearly one in...
Sepsis accounts for highest number of hospitalisation re-admissions
Sepsis hospitalisations account for a higher proportion of unplanned 30-day re-admissions than hospitalisations for heart attack, heart failure, COPD, and pneumonia in the US,...
Catheter safeguards slash infections and hospital costs
Interventions related to central venous catheters were, on average, associated with 57% fewer bloodstream infections and substantial savings to hospitals, found a multi-centre analysis.
US...
Up to 50% of ICU stays may be unnecessary
Intensive Care Units (ICUs), which provide the most expensive and invasive forms of care in a hospital setting, are being used too often for...
New guidelines on urinary catheter use
A new guide gives doctors and nurses information to help decide which hospital patients may benefit from a urinary catheter – and which ones don’t.
Enhanced recovery programme benefits
Patients undergoing colorectal operations who participated in an enhanced recovery programme left the hospital sooner and had significantly lower hospital costs.
Hospital gastroenteritis measures lacking
Noroviruses, responsible for over 50% of global gastroenteritis cases, can spread by air up to several metres from an infected person according to a Université Laval study.
Anti-infection key steps not taken
Nearly half of US hospitals aren't taking key steps to prevent Clostridium difficile infections that kills nearly 30,000 people annually and sickens hundreds of thousands more – despite strong evidence that such steps work.
Hand washing reminder gets cold shoulder
Most patients are willing to remind health care workers to wash their hands while in the hospital, suggests a South Korea study, but doctors and nurses don't like the idea.
Patient satisfaction unaffected by remodelling
Contrary to previous studies, Johns Hopkins researchers found that patients’ satisfaction scores only modestly improved based on the newly remodelled design of a hospital.