Suitability of Sterillium Gel™ for surgical hand disinfection

In some countries, alcohol-based hand gels are used for hygienic hand disinfection but their efficacy and suitability for surgical hand disinfection has never been investigated. The efficacy of Sterillium Gel™ was investigated according to prEN 12791 in two separate experiments. Finger tips of 20 vo...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Journal of hospital infection 2003-07, Vol.54 (3), p.222-225
Main Authors: Kampf, G, Kapella, M
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
1-Propanol - pharmacology
Alcohol-based hand gel
Anti-Infective Agents, Local - pharmacology
Antibiotics. Antiinfectious agents. Antiparasitic agents
Antiseptics
Bacteria - drug effects
Biological and medical sciences
Colony Count, Microbial
Cross-Over Studies
Ethanol - pharmacology
Gels
Hand Disinfection - methods
Humans
Medical sciences
Pharmacology. Drug treatments
prEN 12791
Sterillium Gel
Surgical hand disinfection
Treatment Outcome
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Summary:In some countries, alcohol-based hand gels are used for hygienic hand disinfection but their efficacy and suitability for surgical hand disinfection has never been investigated. The efficacy of Sterillium Gel™ was investigated according to prEN 12791 in two separate experiments. Finger tips of 20 volunteers per experiment were sampled for resident skin bacteria before surgical hand disinfection. In a cross-over design, each volunteer carried out a surgical hand disinfection with the reference alcohol [n-propanol 60%, (v/v)] or Sterillium Gel™ [ethanol 85% (v/v)] for 3 min. After the product application, one hand was sampled for the immediate effect, the other hand was gloved for 3 h and then sampled for the sustained effect. Samples were analysed for remaining resident bacteria. The mean of the pre-value, the 0 h and 3 h values of the reference disinfection and the test product were calculated. With the reference alcohol, respective mean immediate log 10-reduction factors of 2.06±0.76 and 2.23±1.13 were found in both experiments. The mean sustained effects with the reference alcohol were 2.03±1.14 and 1.44±0.81. Sterillium Gel™ achieved respective mean immediate effects of 2.48±1.06 and 2.13±0.81, the mean sustained effects were 2.77±0.95 and 2.18±0.72. They proved significantly larger than those obtained with the reference alcohol ( P
ISSN:0195-6701
1532-2939
DOI:10.1016/S0195-6701(03)00087-2