John Boyce, MD, a renowned infectious disease specialist and hospital epidemiologist and colleague Richard Martinello, MD a medical director of infection prevention devised an innovative method to assess how well HCPs perform hand hygiene using portable thermal imaging. Check out how they were able to better examine hand hygiene technique. Dr. Cervantes speaks on how she and her colleagues did a cross-sectional study using data derived from the 2020 APIC MegaSurvey to describe the state of...

Join our hosts Jessie Swain and Nicki Shorr as they talk with Dr. Janet Glowicz, a Senior Infection Preventionist with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion on pragmatic suggestions to improve safe handling of laundered healthcare textiles. This practice forum is based on multiple outbreak reports over the last decade and observations of practices CDC has made during responses. With special guests: Janet Glowicz, Senior Infection...

Join our host Jessie Swain as she talks with Erin Sparnon, a member of the team at ECRI that surveyed sterile processing staff to learn about human factors issues in the cleaning process and share best practices. With special guest: Erin Sparnon MEng

Listen in as our hosts Nicki Shorr and Jessie Swain talk to Dr. Marybeth Sexton to discuss her research into the risk factors for isolation of carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales from normally sterile sites and the implications for infection prevention. With special guest: Mary Elizabeth Sexton MD, MSc

Tune in to hear our hosts Nicki Shorr and Jessie Swain talk with Dr. Valerie Vaughn about partnering to reduce overuse of antibiotics when patients are discharged. With special guest: Valerie Vaughn, MD, MSc

Tune in to hear our hosts Nicki Shorr and Jessie Swain talk with Ann Scheck McAlearney, ScD, MS about how executive leadership attention and strategic communication strategies can help support evidence-based infection prevention practices. With special guest: Ann Scheck McAlearney, ScD, MS

Tune in to hear our hosts Nicki Shorr and Jessie Swain talk with infection preventionists Rachel Guran and Kelsi Canavan along with Dr. Paula Eckardt about containing a carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii complex outbreak in a COVID-19 intensive care unit. With special guests: Rachel Guran, MPH, BSN, RN, CIC, Kelsi Canavan, MPH, MPA, CIC and Paula A. Eckardt, MD, FACP, FIDSA, AAHIVS

Listen as our hosts speak with researcher Jingjing Shang about increasing flu vaccination of home healthcare personnel using policies, easy access to vaccine, and incentives. Also, tune in to hear from infection preventionist Debra Runyan about what a decade-long study tells us about how fogging can help in efforts to reduce C. difficile.

Listen as our hosts speak with Infection Preventionist Lisa Sturm about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on hospital-onset bloodstream infections (HOBSI) in one large health system. What can we learn from this system's experiences during the pandemic to help us reduce healthcare-associated infections?

Listen as we speak with our guests about how technology can impact the daily work of infection preventionists, specifically using the electronic medical record (EMR) to better predict possible outbreaks, respond to them more quickly, and to better differentiate between community and hospital onset infections. Further, we'll discuss possible methods of improving patient outcomes while in isolation, the lack of quality evidence for effective interventions, and the need for future research in...

Listen as our hosts talk with Dr. Gina Piscitello of Rush University Medical Center about a study she and her colleagues conducted entitled “COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy among Health Care Workers, Communication and Policy-Making.” During this episode hosts discuss the Health Belief Model used in this study, whether vaccine hesitancy among healthcare workers impacts public hesitancy, who the public trusts for advice on vaccination, and what the implications are for the current pandemic and...

Listen as our hosts talk with Dr. Selcen Kilinc-Balci, an author of a National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) study that illustrates the importance of looking closely at how gowns and gloves work together to protect healthcare workers. The discussion provides insight into what can be done now to help protect healthcare personnel, and what may be considered as part of future standards development.

Listen as our hosts talk with educator and researcher Dr. Zainab Toteh Osakwe about her article on the intense experiences of Home Health Aides during the COVID-19 Pandemic in New York City. Learn how this situation applies to the everyday infection prevention needs of HHAs and how we can better meet their critical need for information.

Listen as our hosts talk with another infection preventionist (IP) and a physician about IP and anesthesia working together on PPE. Next, they talk with the inventor of a new automated device that captures portable medical equipment disinfection data. Go to AJIC for more information about our guests and to access the related AJIC articles.

Listen as our hosts discuss the intensity of the experiences of infection preventionists (IPs) during the first 9-months of the COVID-19 pandemic through input gleaned from IPs in rural, urban and suburban settings. These experiences serve to highlight the important role of IPs in pandemic preparedness, emergency management, and crisis standards of care.

Infection preventionists discuss two issues with authors of articles in the August issue of the American Journal of Infection Control (AJIC): (1) the shedding of MRSA and multi-drug resistant gram-negative bacilli and how to prevent the spread of these organisms outpatient settings; (2) how a team science approach can be helpful in bringing together antibiotic stewardship and infection prevention teams and the importance of team science approaches in general.