Another IPS conference has been and gone, and what a lot of fun and learning to be had! New research published, new products launched, and new contacts made – all in a few days in sunny Harrogate. Several of the lectures were outstanding: Prof Gary French on the ‘swing’ away from antibiotic-resistant Gram-positive bacteria towards Gram-negatives, Prof Eli Perencevich on measuring and improving hand hygiene, plus inspiring lectures from both IPS patrons (Professors Hart and Pittet). It’s great to see all of the submitted abstracts published in a Journal of Infection Prevention supplement. Here’s a few highlights from the abstracts:

• ‘Room staging’ (the location of a UV device) is vital in terms of maximising efficacy (#4652).
• Laboratory testing of disinfectants needs to consider the impact of biofilms on dry hospital surfaces (#4624 on the efficacy of superoxidised water, and #4640 on developing meaningful laboratory tests for disinfectants accounting for biofilms).
• Further evidence that simple, educational interventions can make a dramatic impact on the effectiveness of cleaning, in this case, increasing fluorescent spot removal from <30% to >70% (#4484).
• The effective roll out of Clinell Universal wipes across an acute NHS hospital and associated community healthcare providers to develop a ‘city-wide’ approach to cleaning and disinfection (#4596).

Gama launched a number of new products at the conference. Finding a sporicidal disinfectant that is safe, effective, and well-tolerated by patients, staff and the environment is challenging. Sodium hypochlorite ticks some of these boxes, but is by no means perfect: it is inactivated readily by biological soiling, has staff exposure issues, and is not environmentally friendly. And so we have introduced a peractic acid based sporicidal disinfectant that ticks all of these boxes. The arrival of the Clinell Sporicidal Granules prompted a protest…from the bugs!

Gama is committed to the importance of training and understand that easy-to-use and up-to-date training materials are a vital resource. With this in mind, we have launched a re-vamped training module, that is designed to be configured to your needs, whether you have 5 or 50 minutes to deliver a training session. The material for the modules has been formulated by Martin Kiernan, our clinical director, and is updated regularly via the tablet-based platform.

Finally, we would like to congratulate the brainy winners of the quiz on our stand: Day 1: Karen Hawker Day 2: Kirsty Louise Morgan Day 3: Jean Robinson

The vision of IPS that ‘nobody is harmed by a preventable infection’ is one that we can all subscribe to, so roll on Infection Prevention 2017!