Gordonia bronchialis Sternal Wound Infection in 3 Patients following Open Heart Surgery: Intraoperative Transmission from a Healthcare Worker

We describe an investigation of 3 postoperative Gordonia bronchialis sternal infections. A nurse anesthetist was identified as the source of the outbreak, her scrubs likely becoming contaminated by her home washing machine. The outbreak ended after disposal of the implicated washing machine. Domesti...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Infection control and hospital epidemiology 2012-12, Vol.33 (12), p.1238-1241
Main Authors: Wright, Shaneka N., Gerry, Joanna S., Busowski, Mary T., Klochko, Alena Y., McNulty, Steven G., Brown, Scott A., Sieger, Barry E., Ken Michaels, P., Wallace, Mark R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Actinomycetales Infections - transmission
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Axilla
Biofilms
Biological and medical sciences
Concise Communication
Coronary Artery Bypass
Dogs
Gordonia Bacterium - isolation & purification
Hand - microbiology
Humans
Infections
Infectious Disease Transmission, Professional-to-Patient
Male
Medical sciences
Medical scrubs
Middle Aged
Miscellaneous
Nurse Anesthetists
Nurses
Nursing
Public health. Hygiene
Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine
Scalp
Surgery (general aspects). Transplantations, organ and tissue grafts. Graft diseases
Surgery of the heart
Surgical specialties
Surgical Wound Infection - microbiology
Surgical Wound Infection - therapy
Washing
Water temperature
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:We describe an investigation of 3 postoperative Gordonia bronchialis sternal infections. A nurse anesthetist was identified as the source of the outbreak, her scrubs likely becoming contaminated by her home washing machine. The outbreak ended after disposal of the implicated washing machine. Domestic laundering of surgical scrubs may need reevaluation.
ISSN:0899-823X
1559-6834
DOI:10.1086/668441