Winter ward closures - update
Categories: 2008 Media Releases
Peterborough and Stamford Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust continues to have one ward affected by winter vomiting and diarrhoea.
• Ward 6 at the Edith Cavell Hospital, which had been closed to new admissions, opened again yesterday after being specially cleaned.
• Ward 10 at the Edith Cavell Hospital is currently closed to new admissions, but as no new patients or members of staff have shown symptoms the ward is in the process of being specially cleaned and should re-open this evening.
In total, 25 patients and seven members of staff on both wards have been affected with Norovirus-like symptoms, although Norovirus has not been confirmed.
John Randall, Medical Director, said: “The Trust, like many other hospitals regionally and across the country has patients that are susceptible to vomiting and diarrhoea infections particularly during the winter. We hope to have both wards open to new admissions as soon as possible.”
Visitors can help the Trust to tackle infections in the following ways:
• Not visiting the hospital if they have had D&V or a cold in the last 48 hours
• Being familiar with visiting guidelines, especially a maximum of three Is it not 2 visitors for each patient and ward visiting times (for the majority of ward areas these are 2-4pm and 6-8pm)
• Not bringing young children to visit patients who have had D&V
• Always performing good hand washing at the patients bedside and use the alcohol gel on entering and exiting ward areas
• Not using patient toilets
• Not sitting on patient beds
• Not sharing food with patients
Ends
Note to Editors:
1. The Trust has rigid infection prevention and control measures in place as a matter of course and is continually looking to make further improvements:
• It has a successful isolation ward in place at the Edith Cavell Hospital and is now introducing this scheme at the District Hospital as well. This will allow it to move patients, where clinically appropriate, with an infection into the same ward to prevent further spread.
• It is always trying to improve antibiotic prescribing to help fight C Diff (antibiotics sometimes destroy the good bacteria in a patient’s stomach which allows the C Diff organism to spread)
• It continually promotes good hand hygiene to patients, staff and visitors
• It has strict cleaning codes in place in normal service and during and after any outbreak
• The Trust recently secured £268,000 in extra funding to help it further improve infection control and prevention
