The results of this joint work will be reflected in the quality of care received by residents in these centres.
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Health and Social Rights study measures to curb antimicrobial resistance
The Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Social Rights, Consumer Affairs and Agenda 2030 have held a working day on “Comprehensive Approach to Infections and Antimicrobial Resistance in Residential Centres for the Elderly”, to discuss measures that contribute to the fight against antimicrobial resistance and to improving the quality of care and the safety of residents.
It is a meeting organised by the Directorate General for Public Health and Equity in Health of the Ministry of Health, the Institute for the Elderly and Social Services of the Ministry of Social Rights, Consumption and Agenda 2030, the National Epidemiology Centre of the Carlos III Health Institute and the Coordination Unit of the National Plan against Antimicrobial Resistance (PRAN).
This conference was held to find joint solutions between all the actors involved in tackling this public health problem and to extrapolate the actions carried out by the PRAN to the social and healthcare environment.
Long-stay residential centres for the elderly play a key role in the generation of microbial resistance and its transmission to the community and hospitals.
The conference was attended by representatives from various autonomous communities and specialised professionals from different sectors, who addressed, through different working groups, the adaptation of the Antibiotic Use Optimisation Programmes (PROA), infection prevention programmes and Public Health surveillance in residential centres for the elderly.
In this sense, it has provided a space for the exchange of experiences and knowledge between participants from the health and social fields, to create joint strategies and promote effective practices in the care of elderly people in residential centres.
During the workshops, participants worked in small groups with social and healthcare managers from the autonomous communities and discussed openly the difficulties, challenges and opportunities of carrying out these programmes.
This dialogue has been an opportunity for mutual learning to identify the pros and cons of each project. In addition, it has provided an opportunity to see how some autonomous communities have been working for a long time and can be a model to learn in-depth about strategies to guide national implementation.
Conclusions
The main conclusions and recommendations of this conference were as follows:
To have quality information on infections and antibiotic resistance and thus be able to make the best public health decisions, it is necessary to have interoperable information systems that allow the integration of social and health information on the people living in these centres. The conference shared several experiences and models developed by some autonomous communities that have made significant progress in this monitoring.
The implementation of PROA in long-stay residential centres, taking as a reference the models implemented in hospital and community settings, is a viable and necessary strategy.
The implementation of the hand hygiene programme, the PROAs and the surveillance of infections in residential centres should be done in a coordinated manner, adapting these programmes to the heterogeneity of residential centres in our country.
Concerning the hand hygiene programme, the experience of the Hospital Parc Taulí in Sadadell and the Hospital Ramón y Cajal in Madrid, with the residential centres associated with these hospitals, served as an example of the implementation of an infection prevention and patient safety programme, thus motivating the participants to get down to work and look optimistically at the possibilities of improving the prevention and control of infections in healthcare centres.
This day highlighted the importance of continuing and promoting collaboration between the social and healthcare sectors.