INFECTION PREVENTION & WOUNDCARE
Nurse Consultant for NRIC, Sue Wiseman, believes global collaboration can improve infection prevention and control through raised awareness and shared best practice.
he National Resource for Infection Control (NRIC) provides information, research and guidance for the public as well as professionals in infection prevention and control.
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Sue Wiseman, Nurse Consultant for NRIC, spoke to NHE about how important these updates are, and why collaboration on a global scale is key to understanding and minimising infections. With a rise in inter- national travel as well as transport of goods, we must increasingly work together to stop the spread of infectious diseases, she says.
Infection Control Week 2011 is taking place from October 9, providing a chance to focus on prevention and control, raise awareness about new issues and encourage communi- cation within the sector. All infection control organisations are probably doing something towards the week, and NRIC is no exception.
Wiseman explained: “NRIC is a website that provides information in a one-stop-shop for infection control professionals. We give knowledge updates throughout the year, and one of them is obviously to do with Infection Control Week. We tend to concentrate on a particular theme each year; this year we are concentrating on the global outlook as far as infection control and infectious diseases are concerned.”
Collaboration
NRIC collaborates with lots of different partners and organisations to provide qual- ity information on the latest infection pre- vention approaches. Wiseman said: “I con- tact different organisations and ask if they want to participate, put some information on the website and let other people know about their organisation. Generally they’re quite happy to get involved.
“The partners that we’re collaborating with this year include the Royal College of Nurs- ing, the ISH (International Scientifi c Forum for Home Hygiene), the IPS (Infection Pre- vention Society), the IFIC (International Federation on Infection Control), the Hand Hygiene Alliance has given a statement about what they are doing, the Independent Healthcare Advisory service, the Association of Healthcare Cleaning as well; they’re all
56 | national health executive Sep/Oct 11
talking about their organisations, and sup- porting what we’re doing. And we’re linking to the APIC (Association of Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology in America) website, and they’re allowing our readers to use their webinars.
“We tend to also include some important clinical issues, which people will need to think about for this winter. That involves hand hygiene again, some important in- formation coming out in October and new guidance around the Norovirus. What we wanted to concentrate on this year was the staff vaccination side of pandemic fl u.”
Thinking big
“The aim of global collaboration,” she con- tinued, “is to encourage infection control professionals to apply the principles of best practice, not just framed in key infl uenc- ing documents locally or nationally, but internationally. Increasingly, that’s what’s happening and we need to raise awareness amongst infection control professionals,
and all healthcare staff. We have to think about the wider community now.
“In the introduction to this year’s site, I’ve talked about the need for collaboration globally because of the unpredictability of outbreaks of infectious diseases and in- creasing antibiotic and antimicrobial re- sistance. With increased human travel and importation of foodstuffs, infections start in one country and they quickly become a Eu- ropean or international problem.
“It is a global issue as well because they spread so easily, with all the travel that we do. There’s a problem at the moment in Egypt with avian infl uenza and the ECDC have put out a quick assessment of that and are keeping an eye on it throughout Europe.
“I’m giving a knowledge update about the bigger global picture and how we must all work together with organisations like ECDC (European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control) and WHO (World Health Or- ganisation).
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