Researchers are looking for ways to reduce infection in neonatal care

Around 10% of newborns in Europe need intensive care. Critically ill babies, however, are highly vulnerable to resistant bacteria. Researchers from ten countries, including Estonia, have started a project aiming to develop and implement innovative methods for infection prevention and control.

Professor of Paediatric Intensive Care and Pharmacotherapy of the University of Tartu Tuuli Metsvaht said that sepsis is among the most common complications in neonatal intensive care and is known to be associated with high mortality and poorer psychomotor development. “Despite rising awareness of resistant bacterial colonisation in newborns, there is very little reliable data on the efficiency of globally applicable infection prevention and control measures”, said Metsvaht.

In the international project NeoIPC, researchers and doctors from 13 organisations of ten countries start to tackle the problem. The Estonian project team is led by Professor Tuuli Metsvaht. The network of project partners has extensive experience in neonatal infection, infection control, microbiology and the surveillance of hospital-acquired infections.

“In particular, the project aims to develop and implement an innovative approach to the evaluation of infection prevention and control interventions. For that, we combine a randomised clinical trial, suitable implementation science strategies and surveillance with novel clinical and genotyping methods,” described Professor Metsvaht. A further goal is to create a pan-European network to improve infection control in neonatal care.

The project “Establishing innovative approaches for optimal infection prevention of resistant bacteria in NICUs by integrating research, implementation science and surveillance in a sustainable global platform” (NeoIPC) includes researchers from Italy (coordinator), the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Estonia, Greece, Belgium, Germany, Spain and the Republic of South Africa. The project is funded by the European Commission’s project Horizon 2020.