OBJECTIVES To evaluate the capability of accident and emergency (A&E) departments in six health regions of England to safely decontaminate casualties exposed to hazardous chemicals. METHODS In January 1999 a postal questionnaire was sent to the clinical director of all A&E departments in Trent, North and South Thames, South and West, North West and, Anglia and Oxford Health Regions. The quest...

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES There has been an extensive invasion of tuberculosis at the global level by multidrug resistant as well as extensively drug resistant organisms. Attempts to recover the pathogen in pure culture have frequently failed since the specimens are often highly contaminated and also due to use of insufficient or over-active decontamination procedures. Hence in the present study ...

BACKGROUND Duration of digestion/decontamination has a considerable impact on yield of mycobacteria especially from sterile body fluids and pus specimens. Additionally, duration of digestion/decontamination affects the contamination rates. This study evaluates the effect of digestion/decontamination protocol for 15 and 20min versus inoculation of media directly from the sample on contamination ...

All of the costs associated with decontamination following the 2001 anthrax letter attacks were summarized, estimated, and aggregated based on existing literature and news media reports. A comprehensive list of all affected structures was compiled. Costs were analyzed by building class and decontamination type. Sampling costs and costs of worker relocation were also included. Our analysis indic...

Shoe soles are possible vectors for infectious diseases. Although studies have been performed to assess the prevalence of infectious pathogens on shoe soles and decontamination techniques, no systematic review has ever occurred. The aim of this study was to perform a systematic review of the literature to determine the prevalence of infectious agents on shoe bottoms and possible decontamination...

OBJECTIVE We examined the impact of selective decontamination of the digestive tract on morbidity and mortality in critically ill children. DATA SOURCES We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, the Cochrane Register of Controlled Trials, and previous meta-analyses. STUDY SELECTION We included all randomized controlled trials comparing administration of enteral antimicrobials in selective decontaminatio...

purpose: to evaluate bacterial and fungal contamination of donor corneas before and after decontamination at eye bank of i.r. of iran based on cultures. methods: this descriptive study was performed on 131 donor eyes (whole globe or cut cornea) used for corneal transplantation at labbafinejad hospital during a 6-month period. microbiologic culture was performed at three stages: before enucleati...

BACKGROUND PCR amplification of minute quantities of degraded DNA for ancient DNA research, forensic analyses, wildlife studies and ultrasensitive diagnostics is often hampered by contamination problems. The extent of these problems is inversely related to DNA concentration and target fragment size and concern (i) sample contamination, (ii) laboratory surface contamination, (iii) carry-over con...

In Europe, on-farm biosecurity measures, involving a strict all-in/all-out batch-management system and decontamination of the rearing rooms between consecutive batches, are recommended to control Salmonella infection in growing pigs. However, implementation of these measures is often relaxed under common farming conditions. Therefore, this study was conducted to assess the relative contribution...