HTML/Javascript

This year, the National Environmental Health Association (NEHA) again invites YOU to participate in the Abstract selection process for the Annual Educational Conference (AEC) & Exhibition, being held in partnership with the International Federation of Environmental Health. The "Be a Voice" initiative gives you the opportunity to tell us what you'd like to experience at the AEC. Tell us topics you'd like to hear about and speakers you'd like to see. View submitted abstracts and provide feedback on them. Help NEHA develop a training and education experience that continues to advance the proficiency of the environmental health profession AND helps create bottom line improvements for your organization!

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

An Innovative Response to Preventing Legionellosis Outbreaks (50m Lecture)


image: www.osha.gov
Between 2005 and 2011, SNHD received reports of 66 single of Legionellosis from people who lived outside of Clark County but stayed in Las Vegas during their incubation period. These 66 cases resulted in 4 investigations of outbreaks; 24 of the 66 cases were associated with these outbreaks. These investigations garnered both local and national media attention that was potentially detrimental to Las Vegas' tourism industry. As a result of these incidents and to better protect the health of the Clark County's 43 million visitors per year and 2 million residents, SNHD developed an innovative and proactive response to investigating single cases of Legionellosis. This protocol includes assessing the risk of the building being colonized by Legionella bacteria, administration of the CDC Environmental Assessment of Water Systems Tool and targeted sampling of potential exposures. Depending upon the results, SNHD makes recommendations to remediate the affected systems along with a follow-up sampling program. This change in response was implemented in April 2012. Between April 2012 and October 2013, SNHD investigated seventeen single cases with known Clark County exposure to Legionella with no outbreak investigations in sharp contrast to the 2005-2011 period. 
Posted by
Labels: , , ,

1 comment:

  1. UnknownDecember 5, 2013 at 9:45 AM

    This response protocol appears to be working in our NEHA host city & I would be interested in hearing more.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)