Straight Dope on Acinetobacter please

You can get info on this from:

CDC: Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 2004 (November 19, 2004) Volume 53 (No. 45) : 1063-1066 at:

www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5345a1.htm

U.S. Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine (USACHPPM)
at:

http://chppm-www.apgea.army.mil

You are welcome!!

Fear of marshmallows is: althaiophobia

Our burn unit had an outbreak recently and all uninfected patients had to be moved to other units. After the infected pts. were treated and discharged, the burn unit got a complete overhaul as it was found in the ventilating system. After a prolonged "shut down "of that unit, it just reopened this week. Yikes!

Can't be said often enough: Wash your hands! Early and often, just like voting in Chicago. OK, that last part is a very old joke.

It's a gram - rod, and, like most gnrs, really loves a wet environment. Like humidifiers of any type--respiratory equipment!! I think, not too sure, that burn units use environmental humidification to help control fluid balance, so that would be another source. Some premies get body humidification for a while, too, for the same reason. The water that goes into these humidifying units should be sterile, and the units decontaminated/sterilized daily.

I'm sure it can live on dry surfaces, I know it likes dirt (as in soil), so when soil gets into a wound, like in an accident, Acinetobacter would be very happy in that wound, and wouldn't mind at all if someone gave it a rid to the pt next door's respiratory circuit. I don't think it wants to be dry for long, and I forget if it's a spore forming germ.

Keeping the overall environment clean is very helpful in diminishing the available germ load one is able to transfer to IVs, ETTs, wounds, etc. Even tho it's not a "nrsg" job, a quick wipe down of the overbed table, siderails, bedside cabinet would help prevent infections of all sorts, Acinetobacter included.

Whenever nurses are told to wash their hands, most go, "Yeah, yeah", and focus on some other thing they believe to be the culprit. I spent 7 years in Infection Control, and handwashing is the absolute cornerstone of the whole thing. Ask the family to wash, too, when they visit.

End of commercial.

i started seeing this prior to the invasion of iraq.

Acinetobacter...."ACE" is the name that our unit has given to Acinetobacter. My hospital is a trauma hospital...we have several cases of ACE that seem to get diagnosed in the trauma ICU. Once stable the patients are moved to either our Medical ICU, one particular step down unit, or one particular Med/Tele unit.
When the RN/CNA/RT are taking care of ACE patients....we don't go into any other patient rooms unless there is an emergency.
We must wear isolation gowns, gloves and masks in each room. The doorway of the room is the threshold that we cannot cross without the above PPE's. We have to do lots of education with patients, visitors, other staff from other units, transportors, etc. The doctors are almost the worst part of the whole system because they say, "I'm not going to touch anything." Then when we try to enforce the infection control department policies we almost have to become the "Isolation police."