Using a preoperative methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus decontamination protocol may help reduce surgical site infections, according to a study published in JAMA Surgery.
To examine the effect of a decontamination protocol on SSIs, researchers assessed patients undergoing elective orthopedic surgery with hardware implantation at a Veterans Affairs medical center in Houston from Oct. 1, 2012 to Dec. 31, 2013.
Beginning in May 2013, all of the patients watched an educational video about MRSA decontamination and were given washcloths, oral rinse and nasal solution to be used the night before and the morning of scheduled surgery.
The researchers found the SSI rates of the patients in the intervention group were significantly lower (1.1 percent) than the SSI rates in the control group (3.8 percent), indicating the MRSA decontamination protocol reduced the SSI rate by more than 50 percent.
"Universal decontamination using this low-cost protocol may be considered as an additional prevention strategy for SSIs in patients undergoing orthopedic surgery with hardware implantation and warrants further study," according to the researchers.
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