Infrequent Air Contamination WithAcinetobacter baumanniiof Air Surrounding Known Colonized or Infected Patients

Abstract

Using a validated air sampling method we found Acinetobacter baumannii in the air surrounding only 1 of 12 patients known to be colonized or infected with A. baumannii. Patients’ closed circuit ventilator status, frequent air exchanges in patient rooms and short sampling time may have contributed to this low burden.

Contamination of Ambient Air with Acinetobacter baumannii on Consecutive Inpatient Days

“…A recent publication by Rock and colleagues at the University of Maryland showed that only 1 out of 12 air samples belonging to rooms occupied by A. baumannii-positive patients were positive for this organism (9). This is indeed an interesting finding, especially compared to our initial publication, which showed up to 40% of ambient air contamination with A. baumannii (7).…”

The role of hospital environment in transmissions of multidrug-resistant gram-negative organisms

“…All reported studies were conducted in adult patients and organisms implicated were CRAB and Pseudomonas species [60][61][62][63][64][65][66]. Majority of the studies were conducted in ICUs [61,63,64,66], one included ICU and step down medical wards [62], and the other was carried out in open wards [60]. In all studies, the air sampling methods differed as some used passive method [61,63,65] while others used the active process [60,62,64,66].…”

“…Majority of the studies were conducted in ICUs [61,63,64,66], one included ICU and step down medical wards [62], and the other was carried out in open wards [60]. In all studies, the air sampling methods differed as some used passive method [61,63,65] while others used the active process [60,62,64,66]. Majority of the studies found A. baumannii.…”

“…Majority of the studies found A. baumannii. The results of the studies were mixed, with 5 studies demonstrating air contamination surrounding colonized or infected A. baumannii patients and 2 studies showing no association (Thailand [60] and Maryland, USA [64]). The difference seen in these studies could be attributed to the climatic differences, differing IPC practices (close circuit suctioning of ventilated patients), and the difference in methodologies.…”