Better cleaning contributes to fall in C. diff rates

The risk of getting C. diff infections in a hospital or nursing home is dropping for the first time in decades, thanks to stricter cleaning standards and new guidelines on antibiotic use, according to an article on the KPBS website.

One of the clearest examples of this is in the VA hospital system, which began an aggressive C. diff prevention program in 2012 that included meticulously disinfecting every spot in a room that held a patient with infectious diarrhea, the article.

The VA also made sure that patients identified with C. diff were identified with a sign.

In 2014, the VA ordered its hospitals to implement antimicrobial stewardship programs, and last year, it reported that C. diff infections had dropped by about 15 percent from 2012 to 2015.

Read the article.