title: Control of a regional outbreak of vanA glycopeptide-resistant Enterococcus faecium, Eastern France, 2004-2009.
abstract: At the end of 2004, an outbreak of glycopeptide-resistant enterococci (GRE) spread from the Nancy Teaching Hospital to more than 40 facilities in the Lorraine region. Because this outbreak appeared to be uninhibited, a regional task force was set up to organize and co-ordinate the management of the outbreak, visiting the affected facilities to publicize the existing recommendations and take stock of the problems encountered in the field. The task force then proposed control measures specific to the region. The proposed measures included promoting the use of alcohol-based hand-rub solutions, isolation measures, enhanced screening policies, cohorting GRE-colonized patients and contacts in special wards with dedicated staff where possible, or failing that, isolating them in single rooms with additional "contact" precautions, maintaining these precautions for GRE-colonized patients until a negative stool sample was obtained after antibiotic treatment (which is a more restrictive definition of "cleared" than usually employed), regional co-ordination of the follow-up of GRE-colonized patients with the weekly publication of a list of institutions that were or had been affected to allow isolation measures to be adopted as soon as known-GRE-colonized patient were readmitted. It was not possible to determine the efficacy of each individual measure on the course of the outbreak. Nevertheless, we observed that the number of new GRE-colonized patients started to decrease following their implementation. Ultimately, 1077 GRE colonizations were recorded in Lorraine, and the outbreak is now under control.
authors.affiliation: Service des Maladies Infectieuses et Tropicales, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Nancy Brabois, Nancy, France. sandrine.henard@wanadoo.fr
authors.forename: Sandrine
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Henard
authors.forename: Vincent
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Gendrin
authors.forename: Loïc
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Simon
authors.forename: Nathalie
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Jouzeau
authors.forename: Nathalie
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Vernier
authors.forename: Jean-Michel
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Thiolet
authors.forename: Bruno
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Coignard
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Rabaud
mesh_terms: D000900:Anti-Bacterial Agents; D003428:Cross Infection / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000382:microbiology / Q000517:prevention & control; D004196:Disease Outbreaks / Q000517:prevention & control*; D016984:Enterococcus faecium; D005602:France / Q000453:epidemiology; D016908:Gram-Positive Bacterial Infections / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000382:microbiology / Q000517:prevention & control; D006784:Hospitals, Teaching; D006801:Humans; D017053:Infection Control / Q000379:methods*; D020713:Vancomycin Resistance
chemical_list: D000900:Anti-Bacterial Agents