Category: Infection Prevention and Control

Placing PICCs for Antibiotics – Potential Undue Risks May Outweight Benefits

PICC placement is common practice for intravenous (IV) antibiotic needs, however, we may be inadvertently placing certain patients at higher risks for complications. A recent study by Paje et al assessed the frequency of PICC placement among patients with CKD stage 3b or greater, a practice discordant with current guidelines. This prospective study included data […]

Jul 19, 2019

A Day in the Life of Central Venous Access Devices

This post comes courtesy of Dr. Mark Rupp, who recently published a study in the Journal of Infusion Nursing about outpatient maintenance practices for central venous access devices (CVADs)! Our patients are increasingly receiving intravenous therapy at home via indwelling CVADs. However, limited data exist regarding patients’ experiences with outpatient CVADs. Regina Nailon is the […]

Jun 18, 2019

Preparing for Measles – What You Need to Know

Measles is one of the most contagious infections and is acute respiratory viral infection currently causing an outbreak of infection through the United States. Measles was first described hundreds of years ago and became a reportable infection in the US in 1912. In 1963, the first vaccine for measles became available. Efforts focused on measles […]

Jun 6, 2019

UNMC IDSHEAROES Enter the Race Against Resistance – Read Their Top Ten Reasons

Life-threatening infections caused by antimicrobial resistant organisms, commonly referred to as ‘superbugs’ have taken the media by storm. MRSA, VRE, MDRO, KPC, CRE, CDI – all acronyms that put fear in our hearts that one day, we will have run out of treatment options. That one day, our patients will die from infections that we […]

Jun 1, 2019

When you see CRE: Add Equal Parts Antimicrobial Stewardship and Infection Control

The following was previously posted by Dr. Marcelin to SHEA Journal Club published online in April 2019. Dealing with carbapenem resistant organisms presents both an antimicrobial stewardship and infection control problem. Richter et al. aimed to predict risk factors for carbapenem resistance among Gram-negative rods (CR-GNR). The authors were particularly interested in whether differences exist […]

May 2, 2019

At the end of 2018, we remember and respect Influenza, 100 years after the great pandemic

The Mother of All Pandemics In the 1918-1919 calendar year, the world experienced the worst influenza pandemic in modern times. Coming on the heels of WWI, the H1N1 pandemic occurred in three waves – in the spring of 1918, fall 1918 and spring 1919. Estimates suggest that the pandemic infected a third of the world’s […]

Dec 26, 2018

Does the Clostridium Smell Diffy? Even the Dogs Disagree…

The C. difficile sniffing dogs are back! There are several prior reports of individual dogs being trained to “sniff out” C. difficile. In a novel approach, the authors of this study trained two dogs simultaneously, and then compared interrater reliability between sniff attempts. They used toxigenic C. difficile frozen stool samples (GDH EIA and PCR […]

Nov 5, 2018

IDWeek 2018: Why We Still Don’t Wash Our Hands

At IDWeek 2018, the annual conference for the Infectious Diseases Society of America, I was struck by one simple truth. We are still talking about washing our hands, or in our professional lingo, hand hygiene. Hand hygiene is the simplest, most effective way to prevent infection. Most of us know this intuitively, without the science, […]

Oct 30, 2018

Intensive Infection Control experience for UNMC ID Fellows

The Nebraska Medicine Infection Control and Epidemiology Department (IC&E) is well recognized for excellence. The department is staffed by 5 full-time Infection Preventionists (IP), a data analyst, and a staff assistant; Terry Michaels, manages the department. Dr. Rupp serves as the Medical Director and is assisted by Drs. Ashraf, Cawcutt, Marcelin, and VanSchooneveld as Associate […]

Oct 1, 2018

Tune into this AMAZING Podcast : The Hot Zone: Biocontainment with Dr. Hewlett

  Dr. Angela Hewlett recently was interviewed via podcast for a Travel Medicine show regarding biocontainment, including how to treat and handle highly infectious agents(yes, including Ebola). The blog posts include everything from what biocontainment is to worse case scenarios and other unique aspects of preparing for, and providing care for, people with these types […]

May 9, 2018