A shift in perspective: Why PPE isn’t the best way to reduce the spread of infection
The Infection Prevention Society recently released a report on the greatest problems faced by healthcare professionals throughout the pandemic. You can read it here. In the report, they detailed the IPC mistakes that were made upon the initial outbreak of the pandemic.
Lessons learnt from last year
PPE was used incorrectly in several cases. The most major of these being that gowns and gloves were often worn for extended periods of time, despite the fact that they should only be worn for single patient use to avoid transmitting infection. Staff also touched many surfaces and items, such as computers, with contaminated gloves.
The Hierarchy of Controls
The major finding was that even the correct use of PPE is not as effective as previously thought. In fact, it is the least effective way to resolve the problem of Hospital Acquired Infections, also known as nosocomial infections.
They displayed this in the following diagram, the ‘Hierarchy of Controls’:
