Decontamination of Incubators in a NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit)

Hospices Civils de Lyon40 enrolled

Overview

Nosocomial infections are responsible for morbidity and mortality in hospitalized neonates. The environment of the neonates and especially the incubators can constitute the reservoir of pathogenic bacteria. That is why decontamination of incubators is a major step in the fight against nosocomial infections in NICUs. The hypothesize is that the usual procedure of decontamination, based on antiseptic molecules, is not sufficient to eradicate all pathogenic bacteria from the incubators. In this study the investigator's aim to assess the efficacy of the usual procedure of decontamination and to compare it with another procedure based on steam pulverization. Another objective will be to explore a possible contamination of the hands of the healthcare workers, that can be involved in the cycle of transmission of bacteria to neonates. Finally, clinical data about the neonates housed in the incubator will be retrieved from clinical reports, to identify the occurrence of sepsis and if so, to compare the bacteria involved in the sepsis and the bacteria present in the incubator.

Study Type

OBSERVATIONAL

Enrollment

Conditions

Health Care Worker Patient Transmission

Interventions

Skin sampling of the hands of the healthcare workers involved in the decontamination of incubators

Each incubator will be sampled in 5 points before and after decontamination. The healthcare worker that will be involved in the decontamination will also be sampled (skin sample of the hand) before and after decontamination of the incubator. All the samples will be analyzed for the presence of pathogenic bacteria, using an inoculation on selective agar then an identification of each bacterial colony.

Eligibility

Sex: ALLHealthy volunteers:

Medical Language ↔ Plain English

Inclusion Criteria: * Healthcare workers involved in the decontamination process of incubators during the study period (period of sampling of incubators before and after decontamination) * The two people involved in the sampling of incubators * The patients (neonates) that will be housed in one incubator decontaminated and sampled during the study period Exclusion Criteria: * Refusal to participate for healthcare workers and people involved in the sampling * Refusal to give access to the clinical data of his child for the parent of the patients included in the study-

Outcomes

Primary Outcomes

Absence of bacterial contamination

Efficacy of decontamination will be defined for each incubator as the absence of bacterial contamination after the process of decontamination

Time frame: Day 0 (just before the decontamination)