Evaluation of a new mobile system for protecting immune-suppressed patients against airborne contamination.
BACKGROUND
Invasive aspergillosis is one of the most lethal airborne dangers for immune-suppressed subjects. Providing patient protection from such airborne threats requires costly and high-maintenance facilities. We herein evaluate a new self-contained mobile unit as an alternative for creating a patient protective environment.


METHODS
Airborne contamination levels were monitored for different simulated scenarios and under actual clinical conditions. Functional tests were used to challenge the unit under adverse conditions, and a preliminary clinical study with patients and staff present was performed at 2 different French hospitals.


RESULTS
Functional tests demonstrated that the unit can rapidly decontaminate air in the protected zone created by the unit and in the surrounding room. In addition, the protected zone is not sensitive to large disturbances that occur in the room. The clinical study included 4 patients with 150 accumulated days of testing. The protected zone created by the unit systematically provided an environment with undetectable airborne fungal levels (ie, <1 CFU/m(3)) regardless of the levels in the room or corridor (P < .01).


CONCLUSIONS
These tests show that the unit can be used to create a mobile protective environment for immune-suppressed patients in a standard hospital setting.
Poirot
Jean-Louis
JL
Hôpital Saint-Antoine, Laboratoire de Parasitologie-Mycologie, Paris, France.
Gangneux
Jean-Pierre
JP
Fischer
Alain
A
Malbernard
Mireille
M
Challier
Svetlana
S
Laudinet
Nicolas
N
Bergeron
Vance
V
D000391:Air Microbiology; D016902:Air Pollution, Indoor / Q000517:prevention & control*; D001228:Aspergillosis / Q000382:microbiology / Q000517:prevention & control; D001230:Aspergillus / Q000302:isolation & purification; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D015169:Colony Count, Microbial; D003666:Decontamination / Q000295:instrumentation*; D004780:Environment, Controlled; D004867:Equipment Design; D005602:France; D005658:Fungi / Q000302:isolation & purification; D006776:Hospitals, Pediatric; D006801:Humans; D016867:Immunocompromised Host; D017053:Infection Control / Q000295:instrumentation*; D009181:Mycoses / Q000517:prevention & control*