Use of Cellular Telephones and Transmission of Pathogens by Medical Staff in New York and Israel

Goldblatt, Joseph Gil; Krief, Iris; Klonsky, Tal; Haller, Daniel G.; Milloul, Victor; Sixsmith, Diane M; Srugo, Isaac; Potasman, Israel

doi:10.1086/513446

Cited by 92 publications

(117 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Staphylococcus aureus (24%) was the predominant pathogenic bacteria in our study and this correlates with Rawia Ibrahim Badr etal [6] and it was 52% in the study by Fatmaulger et al [18]. Among that 14% were MRSA in our study which was 18% in a study by Datta P et al, [19] and higher (39%) in other studies [20]. The percentage of Gram Negative bacilli isolated from HCPs' in our study is 18% and is similar to the results of Ramesh J etal [21], (15%).The predominant pathogenic bacteria isolated from HCWs' by Shekhar Pal et al, [8] [2,4,10].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

Mobile phones of health care professionals: a potential threat to infection control in a tertiary care hospital

Manikandan¹,

Jeya²,

Sasikala³

2017

IJCBR

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

Mobile phones of health care professionals: a potential threat to infection control in a tertiary care hospital

Manikandan¹,

Jeya²,

Sasikala³

2017

IJCBR

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“…Micro-organisms can be transferred from person to person or from inanimate objects (such as stethoscopes, bronchoscopes, pagers, ballpoint pens, patient hospital charts ,computer keyboards, mobile phones and fixed telephones) to hands and vice versa [4,6,8,11,[13][14][15][16][17][18] .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A well-practiced infection control plan that encompasses hand hygiene, environmental decontamination, surveillance and contact isolation is effective for prevention of such nosocomial infections [3,9,10] . Despite these measures, colonization of potentially pathogenic organisms on various objects, such as stethoscopes, bronchoscopes, pagers, ballpoint pens, patient hospital charts, computer keyboards and mobile phones has been reported as a potential vehicle for transmission of nosocomial pathogens from HCWs [1,7,8,[11][12][13] . Nowadays, the usage of mobile phone in health care services is being increased.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bacterial Contamination and Resistance to Commonly Used Antimicrobials of Healthcare Workers' Mobile Phones in Teaching Hospitals, Kerman, Iran

Sepehri¹

2009

American Journal of Applied Sciences

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Problem Statement:The contamination rates of Health Care Worker's (HCW) mobile phones and resistance to commonly used antimicrobials were evaluated in three teaching hospitals in Kerman, Iran. So, we examined 150 randomly selected HCWs in three teaching hospitals in Kerman, Iran, 2007. For each HCW a sterile swab moistened with sterile water was rotated over the surface of both sides of his/her phone, a second swab for the sampling of the dominant hand. Both swabs were cultured by the routine methodology in use at laboratory. Plates were incubated aerobically at 37°C for 48 h. Approach: All samples were examined for the antimicrobial activity for commonly used antimicrobials using disc diffusion method. Results: A total of 48 (32.0%, CI95 24.6-40.1%) mobile phones and 59 (39.3%, CI95 31.5-47.6%) of dominant hands had bacterial contamination and Staphylococcus epidermidis was the most commonly cultured organisms from all sites. The resistance rates to commonly used antimicrobials in isolated bacteria from phones and dominant hand varied from 6.7% for cephalothin to 25% for amoxicillin, respectively. Conclusions/Recommendations: The kind of isolated microorganisms and their susceptibility to commonly used antimicrobials from dominant hands were almost similar with those from phones (p<0.05). In conclusion, the results indicated that the rate of bacterial contamination of the HCW's phone is just below 50%, accompanying with a resistance rate to the common used antibiotics in one fourth of all the cases. Therefore, mobile phones could be an important source of nosocomial infections and the spread of bacterial resistance bacteria in medical healthcare settings.

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“…Cep telefonu kullanan kişinin telefonunun, el florasında bulunan bakterilerle kontamine olabilme olasılığı yüksektir. Yapılan çalışmalarda telefon yü-zeyinde Staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus epidermidis, Escherichia coli, Acinobacter, Enterococcus, metisilin dirençli Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus sp, Pseudomonas aeroginosa, Klebsiella pneumoniae bakterilerinin kolonize olduğu gösterilmiştir [5,6]. Türkiye'de 19 Mayıs Üniversitesi Hastanesi'nde ameliyathanelerde ve yoğun bakım ünitesinde çalışmakta olan kişilerin kullanmakta oldukları telefonlarından yapılmış olan benzer bir ça-lışmada, sağlık çalışanlarının telefonlarında %94,5 oranında bakteri kolonizasyonu bulunmuştur.…”

Section: İstatistiksel Analizunclassified

“…El yıkama alışkanlığının floraya etkisi üzerine yapılmış pek çok bilimsel çalışma bulunmaktadır. [5,6].…”

Section: Introductionunclassified

Effects of various factors on bacteria colonization at the mobile phones and on the hands of medical faculty students

Unal

Tahmaz²,

Serin³

et al. 2014

J Clin Exp Invest

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Objective: Microorganisms ping pong effect from hand to cell phone can actualize. The aim of this study was to investigate the bacterial diversity and to compare the similarities of bacteria of the thumb, forefinger cultures and smart phones surface swab cultures taken from the Baskent University Faculty of Medicine students. We also targeted that to compare bacterial disparity of clinical and preclinial students and to see the affect of hand washing, cell phone cleaning practice on bacterial variability.Methods: after voluntary informed consent forms were signed, students from Baskent University Faculty of Medicine were included to the study. Finger cultures were taken from thumb, forefinger of their active hands. Swab cultures collected from surface of the smart phones. Identifications of isolated colonies were performed with conventional methods.Results: Smartphone and finger cultures were collected from total 230 subjects, including 143 women 87 men's. 65% of cultures were taken from preclinical student and the rest from clinical students. Bacterial similarity was recovered from finger cultures and Smartphone cultures in 79% of volunteers (p<0.001). Conclusion:Our study was revealed that hand cleaning was affecting bacterial diversity and the frequency of hand washing influenced the bacterial variety. Although we expected to find a significant difference for bacterial diversity between preclinical and clinical students, our study did not confirm this opinion. J Clin Exp Invest 2014; 5 (3): 410-414

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Use of Cellular Telephones and Transmission of Pathogens by Medical Staff in New York and Israel

Cited by 92 publications

References 11 publications

Mobile phones of health care professionals: a potential threat to infection control in a tertiary care hospital

Mobile phones of health care professionals: a potential threat to infection control in a tertiary care hospital

Bacterial Contamination and Resistance to Commonly Used Antimicrobials of Healthcare Workers' Mobile Phones in Teaching Hospitals, Kerman, Iran

Effects of various factors on bacteria colonization at the mobile phones and on the hands of medical faculty students

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