Study: Hospital keyboards can spread germs
Tuesday, April 12th, 2005 at 5:10 pm
Harmful bacteria can survive as long as 24 hours on computer keyboards, a study released Monday showed, highlighting what could be a growing threat as hospitals increase investment in technology.
The study carried out at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago found that keyboards can contaminate the fingers, bare or gloved, of a nurse or doctor, who could then transfer bacteria to patients.
"The emerging trend in hospitals is to have electronic health records … some hospitals are putting computers in every patient room," said Dr. Gary Noskin, medical director of health-care epidemiology at the Chicago hospital.
His team contaminated keyboards with three types of bacteria commonly found in hospitals: vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus faecium, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa.
Source: CNN.com
And not to mention transferring bacteria to themselves… The ED where I work at during school breaks uses a computer based patient tracking system (as well as order entry, etc.), necessitating frequent contact with computer keyboards. Due to patient volume/acuity, staff rarely got the chance at the fabled 30-minute meal break, where you were allowed to leave the department for food. Consequently, most staff at their meal at their workstation whilst touching the keyboards, directly transferring those nasty microbes to their oral cavity. It's amazing more staff didn't get sick. I guess we can thank our industrial-strength immune systems which developed after being in close proximity to infectious agents day in and day out. Patients don't always have such defenses - so remember, always wash your hands! This has your daily/weekly/monthly, ok in no way regular, Public Service Announcement.
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haha yummy. but you did get sick! oh maybe that was just lack of sleep
Yeah, lack of sleep, and lack of adaquate nutritional support… i.e. vitamins, etc.