An NHS hospital that upgraded the type of face masks used by staff on Covid-19 wards recorded a dramatic fall of up to 100% in hospital-acquired coronavirus infections among those workers, research has indicated.
Addenbrooke’s hospital in Cambridge upgraded the masks from fluid resistant surgical masks (FRSMs) to filtering face piece 3 (FFP3) respirators, with the change made in late December in response to its own staff testing data.
Public Health England (PHE) had, until recently, recommended that healthcare workers caring for Covid-19 patients should use FRSMs as respiratory protective equipment.
PHE recommended that an FFP3 respirator should be used if an aerosol-generating procedure were being carried out, such as inserting a breathing tube into a patient’s windpipe.
Guidance has been updated recently to oblige NHS organisations to assess the Covid-19 risk to staff and provide FFP3 respirators where appropriate.
Addenbrooke’s has been testing staff for Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic, even when workers showed no symptoms.
Tests indicated that healthcare workers caring for Covid-19 patients were at greater risk of infection than staff on non-Covid wards, even when using the recommended respiratory protective equipment. In response, the hospital’s infection control committee upgraded the type of masks used by staff on Covid-19 wards.
Prior to the upgrade, Covid-19 cases were higher among staff on Covid-19 wards compared with non-Covid wards in seven out of the eight weeks analysed by researchers.
Following the change in protective equipment, the incidence of infection on the two types of ward was similar.
The research has not yet been peer-reviewed, but is being released early because of the urgent need to share information relating to the pandemic. …
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