Impact of patient visiting activities on indoor climate in a medical intensive care unit: A 1-year longitudinal study

Tang, Chin-Sheng; Chung, Feng-Fang; Lin, Meng‐Chih; Wan, Gwo-Hwa

doi:10.1016/j.ajic.2008.06.011

Cited by 31 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…The results measured in this study are of the same order of magnitude in comparison with similar studies (Tang et al 2009;Wan et al 2011). It should be noted though that different sampling devices, spatial characteristics (population density) and hospital occupancy may significantly affect the results, thus comparisons should not be made hastily.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 69%

“…Although no visitors are allowed in both ICUs, personnel, patients and medical students visiting ICU1 further contribute to the aggravation of the IAQ. In a relative study, a significant association was found between the coarse particle concentration and the number of patient visitors, since it was found that the concentration levels were higher after patient visitation in a medical intensive unit (Tang et al, 2009).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Indoor mass concentrations of particulate matter in hospital environment

Gaidajis

2014

Global NEST: The International Journal

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The assessment of the indoors air quality where people usually spend extended time periods, especially for sensitive population groups such as patients during their hospitalization, is of major importance. Ensuring a safe level of air quality in these indoor environment serves as an amelioration factor for human health not only for the often habitués of those indoors places, but also for the working personnel that spend more than 90% of their time indoors. In that aspect the concentration of coarse (PM 10 ) and fine (PM 2.5 , PM 1.0 ) particulate matter was measured in two Intensive Care Units (ICU), with different spatial and trespassing characteristics, of the Democritus University Hospital situated at Alexandroupolis, Greece. The measurements were conducted with the application of two portable aerosol monitoring equipment (TSI DustTrak 8520 and Grimm 107).The results indicated that the 24-h average concentrations were below the indicative limits proposed by the World Health Organization (WHO) (50 and 25 μg m -3 for PM 10 and PM 2.5 respectively). Relatively elevated instant concentration levels (>100 μg m -3 ) were also recorded during specific activities and in conjunction with the temporal variation of the observed concentration levels raised questions regarding the side effects of cleaning activities.

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 69%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Indoor mass concentrations of particulate matter in hospital environment

Gaidajis

2014

Global NEST: The International Journal

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“…After going through all the steps to select and assess the eligibility of these documents, five papers were retained: a randomised control trial, [19] three observational studies [20][21][22] and a longitudinal study. [23] The document selection diagram is presented in Figure 2. A summary description of the studies and their results are presented in Table 4.…”

Section: Additional Search For Studies On Risk Of Hospitalacquired Inmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hospital visiting policies – impacts on patients, families and staff: A review of the literature to inform decision making

Bélanger

Bussières

Rainville

et al. 2017

JHA

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Some healthcare organizations recommend adopting open visiting policies. These organisations are working towards the end goal of promoting the idea that patients and families can be true partners in care. An essential step in this culture shift involves openness to family presence and their engagement in the patient's care. Among other things, their recommendations are based on data from studies that assessed the impacts of different types of visiting policies on patients, families and healthcare staff. In order to inform and guide an organizational reflection on possible changes to our hospital center's visiting policies, our team undertook a systematic review that focussed on the advantages and disadvantages of open/flexible visiting policies, as perceived by patients, families and staff. Review articles and original articles were assessed and synthesized following a rigorous review process. Results of the reviewed studies suggest that flexible visiting policies lead to greater patient satisfaction with care and to positive impacts for both patients and families, and that these stakeholders have clear preferences for open/flexible policies. Nevertheless, policies including some guidelines to safeguard rest and sleep periods were deemed necessary by patients, rather than an unqualified open policy. Results also suggested that flexible visiting hours were not associated with an increased risk in hospital-acquired infections or septic complications in intensive care units (ICUs), where the majority of the reviewed studies were carried out. Authors recommended taking the specific context of care units into account when implementing new visiting policies, as needs may be different according to different health issues. Staff preferences over a model or the other were somewhat mixed. Some staff see the presence of families and visitors as an obstacle to the provision of care and a reason to fear increased workloads. In order to overcome this resistance, the importance of adequately preparing staff and supporting them throughout the policy change to ensure its success is highlighted.

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“…However, the distinctly patterns of microbial concentration change between the two sampling runs render the effect of visitation inconclusive, as other transportation routes may also play critical roles in the airborne concentration increases of these bacteria. Tang et al (2009) reported their findings concerning the effect of patient visitation on the indoor air quality in a small ICU. They concluded that the CO 2 , coarse particle (i.e, particulate size greater than 10 μm) and fungal concentrations were significantly greater after patient visitation, and that the coarse particle concentration showed strong correlation with the number of visitors in the ICU, whereas the bacterial concentration did not differ significantly.…”

Section: Effects Of Patient Visitation Activities and Local Air Purifmentioning

confidence: 99%

Airborne and Surface-Bound Microbial Contamination in Two Intensive Care Units of a Medical Center in Central Taiwan

Huang

Shi

Chen

et al. 2013

Aerosol Air Qual. Res.

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Samples of airborne and surface-bound microbial contamination were taken in two intensive care units of a large-scale medical center. Microbial analyses included total bacterial and fungal loads, as well as the four bacterial species of Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Acinetobacter baumannii. Among the 114 surface samples taken from seven designated surface locations of room and equipment for each patient, P. aeruginosa was the most frequently detected (19.3%) and most abundant (mean count: 4.18 cfu/plate) bacterium, whereas the respirator represented the most heavily contaminated surface location in both total pathogenic bacteria colony counts (272 cfu) and frequency of positive detection (38.2%). P. aeruginosa also represented the most frequently detected (39.1%, n = 46) and abundant (11.52 ± 17.16 cfu/m 3 ) bacterium in the air samples (n = 46), and was the only bacterium exhibiting a positive correlation of the mean counts between air and surface samples. The data analysis results further suggested a higher value of relative risk among the infected patients in the presence of the pathogens as compared to those in the absence of them, although the evidence of a of correlation for the individual bacterial species between the environmental samples and infected patients was inconclusive. This study also found that the mean airborne counts and the detection frequencies of these bacteria after patient visitation periods were higher than those before visitation, and that the installation of local air ionizers did not lead to any discernible differences in total bacterial and fungal concentrations.

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Impact of patient visiting activities on indoor climate in a medical intensive care unit: A 1-year longitudinal study

Cited by 31 publications

References 19 publications

Indoor mass concentrations of particulate matter in hospital environment

Indoor mass concentrations of particulate matter in hospital environment

Hospital visiting policies – impacts on patients, families and staff: A review of the literature to inform decision making

Airborne and Surface-Bound Microbial Contamination in Two Intensive Care Units of a Medical Center in Central Taiwan

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