MRSA Survivors Unite for World MRSA Day
The Fifth Annual World MRSA Day Kickoff Event & Global C diff Summit will be held on Saturday, September 28, 2013 at the Hinsdale Community House in Hinsdale, Illinois.
Jeanine Thomas, founder of Chicago based MRSA Survivors Network says "Hospitals in the US continue to under report MRSA infections…”
MRSA Action UK’s opinion is that MRSA and other infections are under-reported here too, with only MRSA bloodstream infections being reported and published regularly, something that the Department of Health needs to address.
Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Unite will give a special message to attendees of the event in Hinsdale, Illinois via video.
MRSA Action UK events
Here in the UK, families affected by MRSA are attending Infection Prevention Awareness days in hospitals and will be hearing from experts in the field of Infection Prevention at the Annual Infection Prevention Society Conference in London, from September 30 to October 2.
The Infection Prevention Society responded the Keogh Review and welcomed its emphasis on maintaining the highest standards of infection prevention and control. In 2012 the Society worked with the Patients Association and Royal College of Nursing to recommend the need for a national discussion on the future of infection prevention and control, both its strategic structures and how best to guarantee sustainability and further improvements over time.
Other key findings of the review supported by the Society include:
· A need to triangulate staffing levels and healthcare associated infection risk;
· Surgeons taking ownership of surgical site infections;
· The urgent need to move towards realistic, accurate, reliable hand hygiene monitoring and compliance reporting with compliance monitored by validated tools;
And (with an emphasis on implementation at the point of patient care)
· The need to routinize hand hygiene;
· The need for hand hygiene products to be available in a reliable way
Awareness raising by family affected by MRSA
Steve and Julia Owen, Trustees of the charity MRSA Action UK will be taking part in the Berlin Marathon this Sunday, a fantastic way to raise awareness and funds for MRSA Action UK. They have run 450 miles raising awareness on our behalf. Steve’s father Donald sadly died as a consequence of MRSA during a routine operation, and the couple are helping by raising awareness everywhere they go.
Infection Prevention is everyone’s business, and staff must be trained in how to avoid infection risk at all levels.
October – MRSA Awareness month
October is MRSA Awareness month, trends in the Department of Health’s reporting show that traditionally October see’s a dip in the numbers of reported cases, this may be down to infection prevention awareness raising and training programmes taking place.
MRSA Action UK would like to see this focus become permanent in all healthcare facilities, with weekly briefings for all staff on how well they are doing, and surgeons being briefed on any infections that have developed after surgery, implementing actions to address any clusters or outbreaks of infection.
Everyone needs to be the best they can be when delivering patient care, everyone must be Infection Preventionists – in the words of Aristotle: "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit"
Photo available on request
Derek Butler
Chair
MRSA Action UK
Email: derek.butler@mrsaactionuk.net
Web: http://mrsaactionuk.net
Telephone: 07762 741114
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