Stethoscopes are used by every healthcare provider and are a universal tool of the trade. Nevertheless, few practitioners put much thought into sterilizing them.
Stethoscopes carried by health care practitioners are loaded with diverse bacteria, including some that can cause healthcare-associated infections, according to a study published today in Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology, the journal of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America.
We conducted a cross-sectional survey of healthcare workers in two community teaching hospitals to understand better clinicians’ beliefs and practices related to cleaning their stethoscopes.