Annual Report 2017
Department of Safety Management, Office of Infection Control and Prevention
Satoshi Iwata, Minoru Esaki, Mika Shiotsuka, Yukako Kuguminato, Mimiko Muroya, Keiichi Koido, Tomomi Sano, Michi Shouji, Ikue Ohmori
Introduction
The mission of the Office of Infection Control and Prevention is to prevent and control
healthcare-associated infections in cancer patients who undergo various cancer care including highly advanced cancer treatments. Our office consists of two infectious disease specialists (physicians), two certified nurses in infection control, two board-certified pharmacists in infection control, an infection control microbiological technologist, and an office clerk. We execute our tasks in collaboration with the Infection Control Team which consists of cross-sectional members from various areas throughout the National Cancer Center Hospital at the Tsukiji Campus. We also collaborate with "link nurses" to facilitate appropriate infection control practices in each ward.
Our team and what we do
- Advice about the infection control and prevention, especially focusing on healthcare-
associated infections, problematic pathogens including multidrug-resistant bacteria, and occupational infections
- Consulting with physicians on appropriate diagnosis of and treatment for infectious diseases (Table 1)
- Implementation of antimicrobial stewardship strategy based on the local data from our hospital and the current clinical evidence (Table 1)
Table 1. Number of supported patients in ICT rounds
- Taking weekly rounds in wards to monitor the environmental maintenance and the compliance with the Infection Prevention and Control Manual
- Conducting surveillance of healthcare-
associated infections and drug-resistant bacteria
- Providing staff education on standard practices regarding infection control and prevention with up-to-date evidence
- Checking for immunization status of the hospital staff and vaccination for those with insufficient protective immunity
- Advice about planning and system development of infection control and prevention measures
- Planning conferences or mutual site visits among regional hospitals to promote the improvement in the infection control and prevention practices in each hospital
Research activities
- Effective education of infection control practice, especially medical device management
- Appropriate dosing of antimicrobial drugs in cancer patients
- Ideal system of infection control for cancer centers in Japanese medical care system
- Mechanism of antimicrobial resistance of multi drug resistant strain of Enterobacteriaceae isolated from cancer patients
- Genetic analysis for novel strain of non-
tuberculous mycobacteria isolated from cancer patients
- Molecular epidemiology of Streptococci and Mycoplasma pneumoniae
- Epidemiology of bacterial meningitis in Japan
Education
- Training in infection control and management of infectious diseases for physicians and medical personnel was conducted.
Future prospects
Our final goal is to establish an ideal and feasible model of an infection control system for cancer centers in Japan.