FEATURE


On the Surface


Daniel Waring, Chief Executive Officer at Pinpoint Ltd, discusses how anti-microbial additives can help to prevent the spread of infection in healthcare environments.


An estimated 300,000 patients a year in England acquire a healthcare-associated infection (HCAI) aſter spending time being looked aſter in the NHS. These include a large number of infections, perhaps the most well-known of which being those caused by MRSA, MSSA, C diff. and E coli.


Such HCAIs are estimated to cost the NHS approximately £1bn a year, not including the additional physical and mental health cost to patients and healthcare workers.


Guidelines published by organisations like NICE and Public Health England, give detailed instructions on the prevention of these infections in all parts of the health service.


While we have become very familiar with some of the measures that can be taken to reduce the spread of infections like hand washing and wearing appropriate PPE, there are additional technologies that can be used to complement these practices.


One of these is the introduction of antimicrobial technology. This technology inhibits the growth of a range of microorganisms on the surface of a product. It offers protection from a number of common infections caused by bacteria, fungi and mould. As the name suggests, such coatings protect against microbes but not viruses.


Bacteria and other microbes are frequently spread by touching contaminated surfaces, objects or people. As with all infections, breaking the chain of transmission is vital to controlling the spread.


This may sound easy enough – just wash your hands or change gloves and other PPE between touching different people. What about the microbes on the surface of more permanent pieces of equipment that get touched a lot? Do light switches, control panels, alarm buttons and personal attack alarms, for example, really get cleaned and disinfected thoroughly multiple times during each shiſt? This is where antimicrobial technology can make a significant difference.


Over the last 20 years, developments in antimicrobial technology have been accelerated, especially for medical device technology applications. In contrast to antimicrobial treatments like disinfectants and antibiotics, which kill microbes when applied, antimicrobial technology offers more permanent protection from contamination by being added to materials that coat the surfaces of objects that might harbour harmful microbes.


- 34 - "Healthcare-associated


infections are estimated to cost the NHS £1bn a year."


It is more effective in preventing contamination long term than cleaning and disinfecting alone as it stops the microbes from building up a biofilm which can be difficult to remove completely. The technology starts to work straight away and is effective for the life of the product. It is built-in, doesn’t wash or wear off or leach out.


There are four main groups of additives that are currently known to inhibit the growth of microbes: silver ion, copper, zinc and organic technologies.


Aſter reviewing the market-leading antimicrobial products, we decided to use an additive based on silver ion technology for our staff security system including Personal Infrared Transmitters (PITs), call buttons and display units. The technology is added to the polymers from which the casings of our system components are made.


The antimicrobial features of silver have been known for centuries. Apparently, even Hippocrates discussed the use of silver in wound care in his writings. The effectiveness of silver is dependent on the silver ion.


The silver ions work in three ways, disrupting the bacteria cell wall, interfering with the production of enzymes, therefore stopping energy production and preventing DNA replication.


This antimicrobial technology makes Pinpoint devices more hygienic by reducing the ability of microbes to grow on the surface. It enhances, but of course does not replace, standard hygiene protocols.


www.pinpoint.ltd.uk www.tomorrowscare.co.uk


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