Less Than 50% of Surgeons Followed Isolation Gown Policy

By Betsy Bates

LOS ANGELES -- Physicians were the least likely among health care workers to comply with hospital rules requiring isolation gowns in rooms of patients carrying multiresistant organisms, according to a study exploring ways to reduce severe nosocomial infection outbreaks.

Among physicians, surgeons were the least compliant, reported Farrin A. Manian, M.D., an infectious disease specialist at St. John's Mercy Medical Center in St. Louis, at the annual meeting of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America.

Gowns and gloves are required as part of modified contact precautions (MCP) at Dr. Manian's hospital in an effort to avert the epidemic spread of infections caused by organisms such as methicillin-resistant