Background
Evidence has recently emerged indicating that in addition to large airborne droplets,
fine aerosol particles can be an important mode of influenza transmission that may
have been hitherto underestimated. Furthermore, recent performance studies evaluating
airborne infection isolation (AII) rooms designed to house infectious patients have
revealed major discrepancies between what is prescribed and what is actually measured.
Methods
We conducted an experimental study to investigate the use of high-throughput in-room
air decontamination units for supplemental protection against airborne contamination
in areas that host infectious patients. The study included both intrinsic performance
tests of the air-decontamination unit against biological aerosols of particular epidemiologic
interest and field tests in a hospital AII room under different ventilation scenarios.
Results
The unit tested efficiently eradicated airborne H5N2 influenza and Mycobacterium bovis (a 4- to 5-log single-pass reduction) and, when implemented with a room extractor,
reduced the peak contamination levels by a factor of 5, with decontamination rates
at least 33% faster than those achieved with the extractor alone.
Conclusion
High-throughput in-room air treatment units can provide supplemental control of airborne
pathogen levels in patient isolation rooms.
Key Words
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Article Info
Publication History
Published online: November 22, 2010
Footnotes
Conflict of interest: Nicolas Laudinet is a microbiologist employed by AirInSpace.
Identification
Copyright
© 2011 Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
