Slashdot Mirror
Resistant Bacterial Infection Outbreak At California Hospital
puddingebola writes From the article: "A potentially deadly "superbug" resistant to antibiotics has infected seven patients, including two who died, and more than 160 others were exposed at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center through contaminated medical instruments, the hospital revealed. The drug-resistant superbug known as CRE was likely transmitted to the Los Angeles patients by contaminated medical scopes during endoscopic procedures that took place between October 2014 and January 2015, a university statement said. " UCLA says the infections occurred via contaminated endoscopes that were sterilized according to the manufacturer's specifications.
(Note: beware autoplaying video ad; adjust your volume accordingly.)
A flexible endoscope is cleaned in a machine more like a kitchen dishwasher than an autoclave. The scope has internal channels for shooting air and water out of a nozzle on the tip. It has a large channel to pass instruments into the patient (biopsy forceps, cauterizers, even other more narrow endoscopes). An ERCP scope has an additional channel that carries a stiff wire that is used to deflect instruments coming out the end. This channel and wire is a very tight fit, so it is more difficult to clean.
Attachments to the channel ports should circulate the sterilizing fluids through all the channels. It's not difficult to imagine a clog preventing the fluid from circulating. Testing for leaks and clogs is part of the cleaning procedure, but in practice, of course, errors happen often:
Similar story from just last month:
http://www.modernhealthcare.co...
A biggy at the VA a few years ago:
http://health.usnews.com/healt...