Healthcare-associated infections are common adverse events in healthcare settings, causing significant morbidity and mortality. There has been a significant increase in the commitment to Infection Prevention and Control worldwide in recent years. This important role and responsibilities are relying on the infection prevention and control practitioners (IPCPs). The competencies of IPCP is thus critical to the success of infection surveillance, prevention, and control program. IPCPs must ensure that they are competent in addressing the challenges they face and are equipped to be competent in fulfilling their duties. Core competencies and professional development of IPCP differ among countries while some are more progressive than the others. This review is aiming to be a reference to develop IPCP core competencies framework and professional development conducive for Asia Pacific region.
In recent years, along with more importance having been given by health care facilities and health administrative departments nationally, the work force of infection prevention and control is constantly increasing. In the new era, to help infection prevention and control practitioners and all health care workers make the right direction in infection prevention and control professional business and make sure the infection prevention and control measures are implemented, what we need is to define the target of infection prevention and control scientifically, identify obligation subjects, and improve the infection prevention and control system and working mechanism from the top-level.
The prevention and control of hospital infection should be precise. Otherwise, a lot of medical resources will be wasted. To achieve accuracy, prevention and control should be considered from the microbial level to enhance its scientific nature. It is specifically reflected in the need of having knowledge of microorganisms, understanding the pathogens of infection and their transmission routes, therefore to carry out prevention and control work contrapuntally. Specific measures include infection surveillance at the microbial level, establishing the idea and habits of infection diagnosis from the microbial level, being familiar with microbial perspective to identify infection risks and vulnerabilities, implementing evidence-based prevention and control measures for different pathogens, encouraging researches on infection control and management at the microbial level, and developing precise prevention and control regulations, standards, or guidelines for specific pathogens.
Carbapenemase producing Enterobacteriaceae (CPE) has emerged as a significant global public health challenge and placing infected patients at risk of potentially untreatable infections. When resistance to carbapenems occurs, there are often few alternative treatments available. Numerous international guidelines have performed systematic and evidence review to identify new strategies to prevent the entry and spread of CPE in healthcare settings. Several key strategies have been shown to be highly effective. Firstly a new strategy that is proven to be effective is the early identification of the CPE carrier patients through active surveillance cultures. While waiting for the screening results, suspected CPE carriers will be put on preemptive isolation in single room and healthcare worker will at the same time practice contact precautions. The active surveillance culture and prompt preemptive isolation will limit the entry and spread of CPE from getting into hospital. Secondly, it is of utmost importance to incorporate enforcement of the basic infection prevention and control best practices in the hospital including, full compliance to hand hygiene, appropriate use of personal protective equipment, execute antibiotic stewardship program to control abuse of antibiotics, effective environmental cleaning and decontamination, staff education and feedback, as well as surveillance of healthcare-associated infections. Such a holistic approach has been shown to be effective in inhibiting CPE from gaining foothold in the hospital.
Coronavirus disease 2019 has been widespread in Hubei province since the beginning of 2020. Many medical teams went to aid Hubei from the whole country. The medical team of West China Hospital of Sichuan University arrived in Jianghan district of Wuhan on January 25, 2020. As one of the earliest teams arriving Hubei, we explored the measures for infection prevention and control of resident, in order to reduce the risk for infection of medical team. The infection prevention and control experiences on the establishment of infection control team, process management, behavior management, clean disinfection, infection monitoring and emergency response and emergency response to exposure of the medical team of West China Hospital were summarized in this article.
To prevent and control 2019 novel coronavirus pneumonia diseases (COVID-19), hundreds of medical teams and tens of thousands of medical professionals throughout the nation were transferred to Hubei to assist COVID-19 control efforts. Medical professionals were at high risk of novel coronavirus pneumonia infections. To ensure the prevention and control of infection in medical teams and prevent cross-infection among medical staff at the medical station, this management standard includes routine management standards, resident disinfection, personnel entry and exit process, and logistics support management, so as to provide reference for medical teams combating COVID-19 in the future.
After more than 30 years of localized development of infection prevention and control in China, a prevention and control system in line with China’s conditions has been established. Since the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic began, with the unprecedented attention paid to healthcare associated infection by health administrative departments at all levels, the awareness of infection prevention and control of various personnel has been continuously strengthened, which has promoted the cross-integration and development of infection prevention and control-related disciplines. However, under the normalized pandemic prevention and control, infection prevention and control work also faces enormous pressure and challenges. This paper summarizes the opportunities for infection prevention and control in the new era, analyzes the current challenges in the field of infection prevention and control, and aims to provide some ideas for the future development of infection prevention and control.