Health- care -associated infections.

Instruction:

.Aim 
.Method

Discussion:

 What is the cause of the infection? 
 Discuss the methods that you can use to identify it. 
 Discuss the type of infections that this microorganism may cause. 
 Who might have spread the infection in the hospital and how?
 What infection control measures need to be put in place to prevent this type of infection in a hospital setting? 

Answer:

Health Associated Infections

Health Associated Infections are some infections that affect a patient receiving treatment for surgical and medical conditions, and most of them are preventable. In Current healthcare or medical care, treating patient needs procedure and some inversive device to be applied for a quick recovery and assessing the patients. This infection can be equated with devices used in medical procedure and surgery, like ventilator and catheters. Health Associated Infections are a milestone to mortality and mobility causes in the united states; these are equated with an increase in the cost of health every year. According to research done data confirm that patient from united state 1 out of 25 patients are affected by this Health Associated Infections (Healthypeople.gov, 2017).

Health Associated Infections occurs or are found in all care setting like acute care, ambulatory surgical centers, the dialysis facilities, long term care facilities like rehabilitation equipment and nursing homes, and outpatient care like health care clinics and physician’s office. There are several types of Health Associated Infections, and this includes CLABSI (Central Line-Associated Bloodstream Infections), MRSA (Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus) and CAUTI (Catheter-Associated Urinary Tract Infections), and also surgical wound is prone in this type of surgical process. Health Associated Infections are very important complications and can be transmitted between divergent health care facilities (Healthypeople.gov, 2017). Nevertheless, research done explains that apply existing practices that are prevention, this may lead to 70% reduction in a particular or a chosen HAIs. Financial benefits are putting into practice the prevention practices are approximated to be 25 billion 31.5 billion in cost saving medication. Some emerging issues in the health associated infections include surgical site infections, Clostridium difficile infections ventilator-associated pneumonia and the catheter associated urinary tract infections.

Aims

This paper is to discuss infections after surgical, by explaining the what is an infection in the hospital environment and how are these infections caused. Also discussed on how to prevent or protect the patient from the infections before and after the surgical practice, discussing who plays the major role in the prevention of infections. In addition, the method used to identify infection.

Method

Achieving our aim to find a clear and concise data on this research there are specific sources used from the internet library this is books, articles and blogs also visited some website to clarify the information or the data collected is correct or similar to give a true information about Infection after back surgery.

Infection

The patient is suffering from a spinal infection, this infection occurs rarely, and it involves vertebral bone, the intervertebral disc space, adjacent soft tissues or the spinal canal. There are different types of infections that affect the four stated above such as the discitis is an infection of the intervertebral disc space. Osteomyelitis is an infection of the vertebral bone in the spine. This infection is usually caused by the fungal or bacterial organisms, viruses or they may affect the patient after surgery or the spinal procedure. In general, these infections are bacterial; they spread to spin through the bloodstream (Dilouie, 2011). Bacteria spread along with the blood through the bloodstream; this affects the vertebral disc present in the spine causing discitis. As these infections proceed the disc space degenerates, this may cause another infection known as Osteomyelitis. This infection also has some side effects or symptoms tingling, bowel or bladder dysfunction, weakness, numbness and tumbling (Fracaro, 2016).

These infections are usually spread quickly by the germs, germs are small microorganisms they live harmlessly on our skin, and within the environment, we are in. It is hard to see with naked eyes since they are microscopic, meaning that they cannot be seen with naked eyes. The germs include the viruses, bacteria and the fungi. They lay harmless on the skin but when there is a small opening or the screen is broken, or after surgeries, they enter and spread into sensitive tissues underneath, and they cause infections (Blanchard & Loeb, 2009). This makes the patient suffer wound infections since they sore the tissue and making it swollen and takes the time to heal. Some of these bacteria or viruses are airborne and are ready to strike on any patient wound or opening in the skin because the break or opening of the skin paves the way for the germs to move from outside the to the inside of the skin. In hospitals infections can be caused by the patient if the patient does not take a clean birth, means that the germs are still present in their skin, if their skin are broken the germs get way into their skin. Also, the nurse can be the cause of the spread, if the nurse operated the patient without cleaning their hand or their tools this cause infections too (Petherick et, al, 2006).

According to (Blanchard, 2009), states that before any surgical practice there are 13 recommendations to be applied and 16 for protecting the patient from infections during and after surgery. This is very simple precautions, and they include nurse should ensure before a patient goes to surgery it is important for them to take a shower and for the surgical team they should wash their hands. The antibiotic should be used to prevent the surgical infections. The nurse should also know what disinfectant to be used before the incision and the structure to use. By applying the preventive measures stated, the risk of being affected with infections is at a low rate. This is because germs do not survive on a clean or disinfected environment or a body. Use of these antibiotics is very important it prevent and also treat all bacterial infections. Finally, the nurse should ensure the surgical room is always cleaned and free from germs and also the patient's bed is also clean (Patient.info, 2017). .

Bacteria image

The image below is an example of a bacteria:

Conclusion

Germs are harmless to human health if it lies out of their skin or their environment unless they enter into a broken skin to form infection to the area. These infections should always be prevented before their treatment arouses. Both the patient, nurses, and doctor play a major role in the prevention of this infections, but the greatest responsibility lies on the healthcare professionals, the doctors, and the nurses.

Bibliography

BLANCHARD & LOEB PUBLISHERS. (2009). Infection. Mechanicsburg, Pa, Blanchard & Loeb.

DILOUIE, C. (2011). The infection. https://samples.overdrive.com/infection-91b013?.epub-sample.overdrive.com.

FRACARO, M., SICKING, J., & VOORHEES, M. T. (2016). Preventing health care-associated infections. [California], Medcom, Inc. https://[institution].kanopystreaming.com/node/112022.

Healthypeople.gov. (2017). Healthcare-Associated Infections | Healthy People 2020. [online] Available at: https://www.healthypeople.gov/2020/topics-objectives/topic/healthcare-associated-infections [Accessed 22 Jul. 2017].

Patient.info. (2017). Wound Infection | Health. [online] Available at: https://patient.info/health/wound-infection [Accessed 23 Jul. 2017].

Petherick, E., Dalton, J., Moore, P. and Cullum, N. (2006). Methods for identifying surgical wound infection after discharge from hospital: a systematic review. BMC Infectious Diseases, 6(1).

SCHMID-HEMPEL, P. (2011). Evolutionary parasitology: the integrated study of infections, immunology, ecology, and genetics. Oxford [England], Oxford University Press.

Spinemd.com. (2017). Neck & Back Pain, Spinal Symptoms and Conditions | Virginia Spine Institute. [online] Available at: https://www.spinemd.com/symptoms-conditions/category/mid-back [Accessed 23 Jul. 2017].

World Health Organization. (2017). WHO recommends 29 ways to stop surgical infections and avoid superbugs. [online] Available at: https://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2016/recommendations-surgical-infections/en/ [Accessed 23 Jul. 2017].