Prevention and Control of Healthcare-Associated Infections: Current Strategies and Future Perspectives

Dear Colleagues,

Healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) are currently one of the most important Public Health challenges worldwide. It is estimated that, in Europe, 6.5% of patients admitted to an acute care hospital develop an HAI. Moreover, there is a growing concern in the scientific community regarding the increasingly widespread and consistent phenomenon of antibiotic resistance. Several bacteria can develop resistance towards antibiotics with different mechanisms of action (i.e., inhibition of cell wall synthesis, DNA replication and protein synthesis). Indeed, microorganisms have gradually developed resistance mechanisms against almost all of the available antibiotics. Specifically, we refer to the so-called ‘ESCAPE’ microorganisms—a term introduced by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)—which are vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus faecium (VRE), methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), Clostridium difficile, multidrug-resistant (MDR) Acinetobacter baumannii, multidrug-resistant (MDR) Pseudomonas aeruginosa and multidrug-resistant (MDR) Enterobacteriaceae. These multidrug-resistant (MDR) or, in some cases, pan-resistant bacteria are the world's leading cause of HAIs. These pathogens are widespread in hospital environments and surfaces on which they can survive for a long period of time and, therefore, cross-contaminate medical devices with a high risk of being passed to patients. During this cross-contamination, a leading role is undoubtedly played by healthcare workers (HCWs) and their behaviour.

Even if the role of the hospital environment is still under debate, it has been widely shown that hospital surfaces that have close contact with patients, such as bed bars and headers, bedside tables, taps, and handles in wards (“high-touched surfaces”), are considered easily contaminable and at risk of transferring pathogens to patients. Moreover, some studies showed the possible role played by “non-classical” surfaces such as healthcare workers’ (HCWs) mobile phones and personal computers, as well as oxygen humidifiers and protective lead garments used in operating rooms. HCWs’ hands play a fundamental role in patient-to-patient transmission by touching contaminated surfaces or patients during care activities.

Current strategies to fight this crucial public health issue include active surveillance, good practises in healthcare and antimicrobial stewardship. However, novel strategies, such as the study of new materials with intrinsic antimicrobial properties for potential use in the manufacture of medical devices and hospital surfaces, are receiving great attention from the international scientific community.

Accordingly, the present Special Issue, entitled “Prevention and Control of Healthcare-Associated Infections: Current Strategies and Future Perspectives”, aims to collect valid and rigorous scientific papers to summarize the current knowledge about this large, difficult public health challenge.

Dr. Alessio Facciolà
Guest Editor

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• healthcare-associated infections
• prevention
• control measures
• current strategies
• future perspectives