March 2, 2015 – CRE

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Anchor lead: Do you need to be concerned about superbugs and endoscopes?  Elizabeth Tracey reports

A type of bacteria known to be resistant to virtually every antibiotic we have was revealed to have been present on an instrument known as an endoscope at a California hospital.  Patrick Okolo, chief of endoscopy at Johns Hopkins, explains what is known.

Okolo: The contamination of endoscopes has been localized to the duodenoscope, one of the many types of endoscopes that we use, primarily for procedures for the bowel and the pancreatic ducts.  They are different from colonoscopies and different from gastroscopes which most people would be more familiar with.     :19

Okolo says the architecture of the instrument is the culprit.

Okolo: This particular endoscope has small moving parts that may not be cleaned properly just using the standard procedures. We now know that the procedures we should use for cleaning these endoscopes need to go far beyond the manufacturer’s requirement.   :15

Okolo says much more rigorous decontamination procedures are in place and people who need to have these procedures can feel confident.  At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.