Hygiene deficiencies in surgical cutlery in the clinic Eschwege

Hygiene deficiencies with surgical instruments in the hospital Eschwege

18.02.2011

The hygiene scandals in Hessian hospitals are never ending. After contaminated surgical instruments had already been discovered in Kassel and Fulda hospitals in recent weeks, hygiene deficiencies in the surgical instruments have now also struck the clinic at Eschwege.

The renewed hospital scandal over contaminated surgical instruments in Hesse illustrates how urgently the previously announced hygiene ordinance is required for the state. For the third time, hygiene deficiencies were discovered in surgical instruments in a Hessian hospital within a few weeks. The clinic Eschwege has canceled due to contamination of surgical tools all planned operations.

Hygiene deficiencies: operations canceled, central sterilization closed
After the hospital scandals in Fulda and Kassel contaminated surgical instruments were also discovered at the hospital in Eschwege in northern Hesse. The central sterilization was closed and all operations canceled, hospital management informed. The causes of the contamination remain so far unclear. First results of a corresponding investigation on the deposits already discovered on Monday are expected at the earliest early next week, the opinion of the clinic. According to the clinic management, some surgical tools are currently being sterilized by external companies in order to be prepared for at least emergency surgery - otherwise the medical care of patients from Eschwege will initially be taken over by the hospital in Witzenhausen.

Hygiene regulation as a remedy for hygiene deficiencies
The Hessian social minister Stefan Grüttner (CDU) had already announced after the hygiene scandals in Fulda and Kassel the introduction of a uniform hygiene regulation for all Hessian hospitals. According to the minister, the planned hygiene ordinance should not only make hospitals responsible, but also oblige the health authorities to strengthen the monitoring of hygiene in the latches. Experts have long been criticizing the poor hygiene situation in many German clinics. For example, the German Society for Hospital Hygiene (DGKH) has repeatedly pointed out last year that hygiene deficiencies in hospitals cause a steadily increasing number of infections with dangerous hospital germs. In particular, the spread of multidrug-resistant pathogens, such as MRSA of the genus Staphylococcus aureus (staphylococci), which are immune to all common antibiotics, prepare the experts as DGKH spokesman Klaus-Dieter Zastrow concern. For this reason, the hygiene expert demanded uniform hygiene regulations throughout Germany last year, because bacteria (...) are the same everywhere and for them „no differences between the states“ consist. (Fp)

Read about hygiene problems in hospitals:
Hygiene Regulation effective against hospital germs?
Again contaminated surgical cutlery in Hesse
Contaminated surgical instruments at the Fulda Hospital
Every tenth hospital treatment hurts

Picture credits: Dieter Schütz