Safeguarding Health through Infection Prevention (SHIP)
Stemming the tide of infection through applied infection prevention research at Glasgow Caledonian University
Implementation of alcohol-based handrub at the point of care helps to improve hand hygiene compliance in a hospital in Cameroon. By Dr Lucyna Gozdzielewska and Nkwan Jacob Gobte Hand hygiene is one of the most important Infection Prevention and Control measures for preventing healthcare-associated infections, yet, hand hygiene compliance remains low in…
By Katie Hendry, Dr Lucyna Gozdzielewska and Prof Lesley Price Effective hand hygiene among healthcare staff is one of the most important infection prevention strategies available worldwide. Hand hygiene also helps individuals to effectively reduce bacteria on their hands in their daily lives. However, uncertainty remains concerning a range of issues related to hand hygiene,…
While it is well known that hand hygiene helps to prevent infections in both healthcare and community settings, to be effective it needs to be performed in the correct way by using the 6-step technique, recommended by the World Health Organization. For this reason, healthcare workers are taught the 6-step hand hygiene technique during their…
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has been declared one of the greatest threats to global health. Resistance occurs when a microbe mutates or acquires genetic information from another microbe, making it resistant to antibiotics. There are many contributing factors, one being antibiotic use in humans, therefore, improving antibiotic prescribing is crucial. Most available research on antimicrobial prescribing…
In a recently published systematic review by SHIP team PhD Student, Ayodeji Matuluko, interventions to improve the review of antibiotic therapy in acute care hospitals have been found to have positive clinical impact in the short to medium term, although there is insufficient evidence of their sustainability in the long-term. The timely review of antibiotic…
By Lucyna Gozdzielewska In a recently published SHIP team paper—co-authored with colleagues from Health Protection Scotland and the University of Strathclyde—the findings of a scoping review of approaches for improving antimicrobial stewardship in livestock farmers and veterinarians are reported. This is an important topic, because microorganisms’ ability to defeat antimicrobials, known as antimicrobial resistance, is…
By Val Ness Antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) means using antibiotics responsibility to preserve their future effectiveness. The nurse’s role in AMS has always been crucial but during a viral pandemic should this role be given more or less priority? Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) continues to cause widespread devastation globally. Although it is a…
In a recently accepted paper by the SHIP team, PhD student Agi McFarland, Professor Jacqui Reilly, Professor Helen Mason and Dr Sarkis Manoukian highlight a need for more robust evidence base in relation to surgical site infection (SSI) prevention. SSIs present a significant burden to healthcare and patients in terms of excess length of stay,…