Martin and Dr Tina Joshi discuss C. difficile, including spore attachment, effect of disinfectants and strain variations

Our end of year special. A favourite paper from the year of our birth and our top picks for this year.

Brett and Phil discuss their ultimate wishlist in the IPC world.

In this episode, Brett and Martin discuss a paper they were recently involved with - a systematic review and meta-analysis on prior room occupancy and the risk to the next person. This paper has been recently published in Infection, Disease and Health. Findings provide some evidence to help inform a risk management approach when determining patient room allocation. The risk of pathogen acquisition appears to remain high, supporting the need for continued investment in this area. Here is a link to the paper. In our discussion, we also mentioned a paper about nurses views on the environment and risk: Mitchell, B. G., Russo, P. L., Kiernan, M., & Curryer, C. (2021). Nurses' and midwives’ cleaning knowledge, attitudes and practices: An Australian study. Infection, disease & health, 26(1), 55-62. Link here: Nurses' and midwives’ cleaning knowledge, attitudes and practices: An Australian study

Martin Kiernan and Jon Otter discuss the complex issue of plasmids and outbreaks

In this episode, Brett talks to Martin about a recent paper on the potential pitfalls of ice machines and following manufactures' instructions.   The paper we discuss is called "How clean is your ice machine?"   This paper was published in the journal of hospital infection: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0195670123002700

We discuss detection of environmental pathogens in the NICU Environment

Jennifer Meddings and Martin discuss prevention of device-associated infections during the pandemic, especially catheter-associated UTI

A discussion as to what thepriorities are for research in resource-limited settings with DrGiorgia Gon from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Health

DIscussion as to whether having no sinks in patient rooms leads to lower rates of infection