Emory Launches Healthcare Test Kitchen Lab to Research HAIs

Emory has launched its first Healthcare Test Kitchen Lab, designed to “validate bedside materials, procedures and protocols to ensure pathogen containment and maximum safety for employees, patients and their families.”

Validation occurs “through simulations where items such as Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and medical devices are contaminated with bacteriophages, which are harmless to humans but spread in a virus-like manner. Lab researchers then observe where the bacteriophages travel within a clinical setting and apply this information to protocols regarding cleaning equipment, donning and doffing PPE, as well as basic and necessary habits, such as touching keyboards, faces and phones.”

These innovations were prompted by the arrival of the nation’s first patient with Ebola virus disease, as questions proliferated regarding how exactly people with the disease were being exposed.

The information gained by the Healthcare Test Kitchen Lab “will be applied across all hospital levels, in an effort to prevent health care associated infections (HAIs) by applying lessons learned in the SCDU to all clinical settings. HAIs are infections that develop after patients receive clinical care for a different ailment. Nationwide, HAIs impact one out of every 31 hospital patients, which can cause life-threatening complications, increase health care costs and exacerbate antibiotic resistance.”

Future experiments will include such things as “sanitation related to nail length and polish type; inadvertent bedside contamination from visitors or staff; and covered versus uncovered flushing in patient restrooms.”