Infection Prevention: Can anesthesia providers spread infection? Absolutely yes -- pay attention to what goes on at the head of the table.

Where to focus your infection prevention efforts. Make these key areas of focus a priority.

Are your flexible endoscopes really clean? 5 reprocessing recommendations.

Potential doomsday mcr-1 gene found in first U.S. patient. The mutant gene resists all known antibiotics and can easily be passed between bacteria.

In Uganda, a vivid illustration of how the basics dramatically reduce SSIs. World Health Organization program helps hospital cut its rate in half.

Making sure it's sterile. Sterilization assurance confirms what you can't see.

The link between warming and wound infections. The latest evidence shows that hypothermia during surgery is associated with greater infection risk.

5 tips for better instrument decontamination. Removing variables and automating the process are the keys to better cleaning.

Look beneath the surface. Take an in-depth look at how you disinfect your clinical environment.

Burning platforms, coordinated care and SSI prevention. Q&A with Zeev Kain, MD, PhD, anesthesiologist and perioperative surgical home proponent.

Take the bundled approach to infection control. Standardized protocols optimize efforts to prevent SSIs.

Standardize your skin prep practices. Get patients, surgeons and staff on board with your pre-op bathing, hair-clipping and skin-antisepsis protocols.

The new standard in endoscope reprocessing. A new national guideline offers clear advice for proper high-level disinfection.

Failing grades in hand hygiene and injection safety. Hand hygiene, safe-injection practices sorely lacking at outpatient facilities. Study finds high failure rates in both areas.

A day in the life of an endoscope. Your scopes are flexible. Your reprocessing standards shouldn't be.

Infection Prevention: Housekeepers are your SSI foot soldiers. A dedicated cleaning crew is the first line of defense against infections.

Disinfect whole rooms at a time. UV light and airborne solutions attack surfaces that manual cleaning might have missed.

Rare brain disease detected in patient. Arkansas facility reopens after a possible diagnosis of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.

Are you committing these common lapses in infection prevention? These are most likely to saddle you with a CMS citation.

Taxing Question: Is it an ASC or part of a hospital? A bundle of cash is riding on the designation.