Description of project
EURIDIKI - Europäisches Interdisziplinäres Komitee für Infektionsprophylaxe
Description of project
“About four decades ago Staphilococcus aureus lost it's until then predominant role as causer of hospital infections”, that is how the authors Pulverer and Schaal are describing the status of hospital hygiene in the early Sixties. In its place, as is described further, the gram negative, aerobic growing bacillus took over the role of the Staphilococcus in a reversed epidemiologic movement.
Meanwhile after having arrived at the age of multi-resistant, globally travelling germs the one-dimensional problem of the Sixties can hardly be understood from today’s point of view.
What has changed during the course of a lifetime in the area of infection prevention? Have we come forth? Do we have better solutions, are we more secure? Or are we collecting jigsaw puzzle pieces without being able to recognize how the complete picture will finally look like?
In a world seeming to revolve ever faster we incited the opinion leaders of then and now to remember – and at the same time risk a look into to future. We asked them to pause for a moment in order to find out where we are today. We went to those who established the rules for the last decades and those who are living by those rules today. And we did not ask the authors to go by a given schema. Each one of them should have the freedom to describe their retrospect and/or projection from their point of view. The outcome is an animated and colourful kaleidoscope of themes and opinions of a total number of 27 authors, drawing a scientific and personal summary in regard to the development of infection prophylaxis during the recent decades.
Therewith the first evidence is given of how much the subject area has changed: had someone asked the same question 40 years ago, the echo would have been significantly different. Today the range can hardly be restricted and varies from the education of hygienic experts to compensation claims, from false behaviour or the capability to change old habits to the worldwide harmonization of views and behaviour. It seems that it is becoming more and more important to learn from each other than being locally and traditionally in the right.
The latter gives cause for the highest hopes. The increasing “globalization” does not only have economical consequences: for quite some time doctors are occupied with the effects – the outbreak of epidemics in Africa does also endanger people in Europe, USA or Canada as well as the outbreak of SARS in Asia. But globalization does only then become a bogey if the phenomenon is being disavowed. Germs don’t know any frontiers. Different behaviour may bring forth or slow down developments, generally since one country or one “school” alone can’t achieve anything today. Infection prevention is our mutual problem; only common strategies will lead us to convincing solutions.
We are very happy that we succeeded in putting together the opinions of experts from Europe, USA and Canada side by side in this publication. And in doing so we might be able to make a little contribution so that not only the dangers threatening us are growing but that all which we have in common might grow as well and thus also our chances to get on top of the dangers.
Sincere thanks to all that were immediately and without hesitation ready to join.
Vienna/Cologne, March 2007
