Nursing procedures (also called barrier nursing) designed to prevent a patient from infecting others or from being infected. The patient is usually isolated in a single room.
Complete isolation is used if a patient has a contagious disease, such as Lassa fever, that can be transmitted to others by direct contact and airborne germs. In this case, all bedding, equipment and clothing are either sterilized or incinerated after use. Partial isolation is carried out if the disease is transmitted in a more limited way (by droplet spread, as in tuberculosis, for example).
Reverse isolation, also called reverse barrier nursing, is used to protect a patient whose resistance to infection is severely lowered by a disease or treatment such as chemotherapy.
The air supply to the room is filtered.
All staff and visitors wear caps, gowns, masks, and gloves.
Occasionally, long-term reverse isolation is needed for patients with severe combined immunodeficiency (see immunodeficiency disorders).
The separation, for the period of communicability, of infected persons or animals from others, in such places and under such conditions as will prevent the direct or indirect conveyance of the infectious agent from those infected to those who are susceptible or who may spread the agent to others. Can also be used in relation to microorganisms (e.g. a bacterial species isolated from the patient).
This is important when treating patients with serious infection or whose immune systems (see IMMUNITY) are severely compromised by illness or radio- or chemotherapy. The procedure also protects sta? caring for infectious patients. (See INCUBATION; INFECTION; QUARANTINE.)
n. 1. the separation of a person with an infectious disease from noninfected people. See also quarantine. 2. (in surgery) the separation of a structure from surrounding structures by the use of instruments.
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