What are nosocomial infections?
Nosocomial infections are hospital or medical facility acquired infections. These are classified, only if a patient has visited a medical facility, for other reason then the later on developed HAI (hospital acquired infection). Any hospital patient is at risk of obtaining this type of infection and will develop it within 2-30 days after leaving the medical facility, depending on the treatment received. There are no specific symptoms for nosocomial infections, since they vary for each type of infection. However they often include: inflammation, discharge, fever and such. Many cases of nosocomial infections are treatable, however some can be fatal, making early detection and treatment crucial. The problem: A nosocomial infection is an infection developed in hospital like environments, often acquired by patients during hospital visits or among hospital staff. Alone in Germany over 30000 people die per year of these acquired germs, even more being infected yearly. By now this hygiene flaw of hospitals has lead to five times as many deaths a year than deaths through car accidents have (6600 a year) . Often times these infections are caused by bacteria/viruses that under normal circumstances are considered harmless, which then often develop in a hospital and become life threatening to patients who come in contact with them. The largest problem however out of all this, is that these bacteria develop a resistance to antibiotics and more frequently can’t be treated effectively, leading more easily to death as well. This is particularly likely to happen when someone's immune system is weak, since their body is already occupied combating infections and bacteria, being exposed to these hospital infections, will kill them easily. Considering most people in a hospital are there for health reason, they become easy target for nosocomial infections. |
How are these transmitted? Nosocomial infections are produced by microorganisms, as well as viruses, which are passed on in hospitals or medical facilities. These often infect people during operations, easily finding their way into the body of a patient through open wounds or flesh, through air and such. Since these bacteria are often ones that are very common and that we naturally carry round with us, they easily are brought into the hospitals. Naturally, these bacteria are not harmful to us until they find away into our body, where they can largely damage body parts. Mostly these bacteria attach themselves to doorhandles, monitors, ...., which are found around the hospital and can stay there for long periods of time, until given the perfect opportunity to find a way into a patients body. Often times they are given this opportunity, through a lack of hygiene by the hospital staff, which possibly didn't follow the expected procedures carefully enough or doesn't sanitize their hands as often as is mandatory. And since they are in contact with the patients with open wounds or such, get bacteria in to these much too easily.