Safety hospital acquired infection

The sole objective of all hygiene and manufacturing controls is to ensure the quality of the pharmaceuhcal product for the safety and protection of the pahent. The manufacture of non-sterile pharmaceutical products requires that certain criteria of cleanliness, personal hygiene, produchon methods and storage must be met. Many such products are for oral and topical use and the question may fairly be posed as to the point of what are now quite stringent conditions. Nevertheless, some carefully controlled hospital studies have indeed shown that both types of medicine may be associated with nosocomial (hospital-acquired) infections and this risk can be minimized by the application of GMP principles. 

This paper considers one aspect of patient safety and examines the role of textiles in relation to infection control, in particular, what is known as hospital-acquired infections or H.A.I. s. 

When patient safety fails, the trustees turn first to the administrative leadership for insights and remedies "What happened, and why " Even when safety hazards recur in the form of hospital-acquired infections in the operating suite, the trustees turn first to the administrator for accurate information and proposed solutions. The inability to provide either may stifle or shorten a promising administrative career. 

Erythromycin may cause increases in the semm levels of simvastatin. The CSM has advised that this should not be co-prescribed with simvastatin. In the first instance the pharmacist should check local policies for management of hospital acquired chest infections/pneumonia to ascertain first and second line choices. If erythromycin or any macrolide cannot be avoided then a practical way forward may be to avoid taking any dose of simvastatin for the duration of the course of macrolide. In addition a recent Dmg Safety Update from the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA, 2008) on statins has highlighted statin dmg interactions and the appropriate actions to take. 

The best measures of harm that we have, and apossible measurement model for patient safety in general (Burke, 2003), are rates of healthcare acquired infections. Most of these infections are preventable and are measured using standardized and well-validated systems and definitions. In the United States, the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention has set out standard definitions, and hospitals have created epidemiology and infection control departments to independently monitor, report and reduce infections. 

---