Contaminated Check-Up?

While stethoscopes are used repeatedly throughout the day by physicians and healthcare workers, the diaphragm comes into contact with the skin of dozens of patients and is rarely disinfected.  Didier Pittet, from the University of Geneva Hospitals (Switzerland) and colleagues have identified stethoscopes as a major potential contributor to bacterial transmission. In this study, 71 patients were examined by one of three physicians using sterile gloves and a sterile stethoscope. After they completed the examination, two parts of the stethoscope (the tube and diaphragm) and four regions of the physician’s hands (back, fingertips, and thenar and hypothenar eminences) were measured for the total number of bacteria present.The stethoscope’s diaphragm was more contaminated than all regions of the physician’s hand except the fingertips. Further, the tube of the stethoscope was more heavily contaminated than the back of the physician’s hand. Similar results were observed when contamination was due to methicillin-resistant S.aureus (MRSA) after examining MRSA-colonized patients. The study authors warn that: “contamination level of the stethoscope is substantial after a single physical examination and comparable to the contamination of parts of the physician’s dominant hand.”