Prevention strategies for influenza in healthcare settings.
By Paul Girouard
It’s that time of year again. We’re heading into the cold and flu season. The season usually gets underway in October and lasts through April. Timing varies from season to season; however, the peaks of each season generally occur December through February. Be prepared.
Preparation and planning are extremely important. A few great resources to use as barometers of flu activity are:
- FluView: www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm
- FluView Interactive: www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/fluviewinteractive.htm
These sites help track weekly flu activity, trends, what types of viruses are circulating, and help track where they are occurring.
To better prepare for the season, it is best to start off with how flu spreads. Flu viruses are spread person to person via aerosolized droplets when people sneeze or cough. The droplets usually travel up to six feet and come into contact either directly or indirectly with mucosal surfaces (eyes, nose, mouth, etc.). The droplets could be inhaled, land on another person, or a high touched surface. For reference, the National Institutes of Health did a study that indicated we touch our faces 23 times per hour.
Recommendations for healthcare professionals are to implement vaccination programs as well as the use of Universal Precautions to help break the chain of infection. Universal Precautions are considered the foundation of all infection prevention within a healthcare setting.
Planning for your customers should include the following:
- Vaccination programs for employees and patients
- Minimize exposure
• If employees are sick, encourage them to stay home
• For patients who are known to be ill, provide separate waiting areas and exam rooms from the general population
• Provide and encourage proper hand hygiene, and supply facemasks/tissues
• Encourage respiratory hygiene and cough etiquette.
- Quick access to hand hygiene, hand sanitizer and hand soap throughout facility
- Use of PPE throughout the facility including gloves, masks, face shields, and gowns wherever an employee or patient may come into contact with pathogens or aerosolized droplets
- Frequent use of environmental infection control products on high touch areas throughout the facility
Lessons learned
What did we learn during the pandemic that can help us during every flu season from a supply chain standpoint? Really get to know your suppliers. We are only as good as our supplier’s supplier. How many times did we have a bottleneck in the supply chain due to a key raw ingredient, packaging issues, geographical challenges, or manpower shortages. The solution around this is to know your suppliers, have cross references, and have contingencies. It may mean that you expand your professional network.
We thankfully learned that we all remain in a people/relationship business. If you invest time into understanding your suppliers’ products, programs, and people, it will come back to provide less challenges with our healthcare supply chain, and ultimately better service to our customers and their patients.
Pandemics and bad flu seasons also reinforce the value of distribution. Distributors that plan can provide inventory management, better sourcing, quality products, and a consultative sales force to help through challenging times.
Wash your hands.
Sidebar:
Last flu season
Last flu season started early in the United States, with activity increasing nationally at the beginning of October 2022 and peaking in early December 2022, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. CDC preliminary estimates are that during the 2022-2023 flu season, 31 million people got sick with flu, 14 million people visited a health care provider with flu, 360,000 people were hospitalized with flu, and 21,000 people died due to flu illness or related complications. Additionally, 176 flu related deaths in children were reported to CDC for this season. This is the third largest number of deaths in children reported during a seasonal flu epidemic since reporting began during the 2004-2005 flu season, CDC reported. Like many seasons, adults 65 years and older were hospitalized at the highest rate last season, followed by children younger than 5 years.