ITU excels in infection reduction

The intensive therapy unit at Mater Dei Hospital ranked top among all hospital departments for reducing infection. The unit reduced bacteria rates among patients by more than 50 per cent in three years, reaching levels exceeding the EU average, Health...

The intensive therapy unit at Mater Dei Hospital ranked top among all hospital departments for reducing infection.

The unit reduced bacteria rates among patients by more than 50 per cent in three years, reaching levels exceeding the EU average, Health Minister Joe Cassar said yesterday. The unit won the first edition of the Mater Dei Hospital Infection Control Award organised by the Infection Control Committee, which noted that the unit had been free of the superbug bacteria, MRSA, for more than 500 days. It achieved this through improving its hand hygiene over the past year but also “consistently improved its judicious use of antibiotics and introduced new work practices for safer management of intravenous and other devices”.

Medical Ward 3 and Neuro-Surgical Ward won the 2011 Best Hand Hygiene Awards while the Observation Ward won the 2011 Most Improved Hand Hygiene Award.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.