Learn Spanish
Just another CMIST Blogs weblog
Nikken Post
Air Ionisers Wipe Out Hospital Infections
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993228
But although the results are very promising, he adds that further research is needed
because acinetobacter infections tend to be cyclical. “They may not be seen for weeks or
months and then you see a cluster of infections,” he says.
Repeated airborne infections of the bacteria acinetobacter in an intensive care ward
have been eliminated by the installation of a negative air ioniser.
In the first such epidemiological study, researchers found that the infection rate fell to
zero during the year long trial. “We were absolutely astounded to find such clear cut
results,” engineer Clive Begg at the University of Leeds, UK, told New Scientist.
Stephen Dean, a consultant at the St James’s Hospital in Leeds where the trial took
place says: “The results have been fantastic – so much so that we have asked the
university to leave the ionisers with us.”
The ionisers produce negative air ions that collide with suspended particles and give
them a charge. The scientists believe charged particles aggregate together and fall out
of the air, thereby disinfecting the atmosphere and stopping the transmission of
infection.
“We don’t fully understand how it is working, but we suspect it is damaging or killing the
bacteria,” says Beggs. “But if the ionisers are cleaning the air in this way, we would
expect to find more precipitation of acinetobacter on surfaces and this is exactly what
we found.”
Test Page
Test information
Hello world!
Hi this is Dave and Rhonda