A recent NYT story: Why Your Doctor’s White Coat Can Be a Threat to Your Health

An excerpt:

A recent study of patients at 10 academic hospitals in the United States found that just over half care about what their doctors wear, most of them preferring the traditional white coat…

What many might not realize, though, is that health care workers’ attire — including that seemingly “clean” white coat that many prefer — can harbor dangerous bacteria and pathogens.

A systematic review of studies found that white coats are frequently contaminated with strains of harmful and sometimes drug-resistant bacteria associated with hospital-acquired infections. As many as 16 percent of white coats tested positive for MRSA, and up to 42 percent for the bacterial class Gram-negative rods…

The review also found that stethoscopes, phones and tablets can be contaminated with harmful bacteria. One study of orthopedic surgeons showed a 45 percent match between the species of bacteria found on their ties and in the wounds of patients they had treated. Nurses’ uniforms have also been found to be contaminated.

My take: Your white coat should probably be washed as often as you wash your underwear (if you decide to wear it).

A recent USA Today article summarized a recent study showing that handshakes transmit more germs than fist pumps. Handshakes Transmit Germs! I think the findings are not surprising but whether to curtail a customary greeting is not so clear.

From NY Times, http://t.co/RoyhpjtPTQ; an except:

Doctors’ stethoscopes are contaminated with bacteria that can easily be transferred from one patient to another, a new study has found.

Researchers cultured bacteria from the fingertips, palms and stethoscopes of three doctors who had done standard physical examinations on 83 patients at a Swiss hospital. They tested for the presence of viable bacterial cells, looking specifically for the potentially deadly methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA. The study appears in the March issue of the Mayo Clinic Proceedings.

Fingertips on the doctors’ dominant hands were the most contaminated, but the part of the stethoscope that touches the patients’ skin held more than twice as much bacteria as the physicians’ palms…

The authors acknowledge that the study was small and may not be applicable to other health care sites. Except for MRSA, they did not distinguish harmful from harmless bacteria.

That bacteria are found on stethoscopes is “not a surprise,” said the senior author, Dr. Didier Pittet, a professor of medicine at the University of Geneva Hospitals. He cleans his own stethoscope with alcohol swabs after each examination, but “most physicians do not.”