Assessing a Novel Method to Reduce Anesthesia Machine Contamination: A Prospective, Observational Trial

Figure 2

Graphic depiction of CFUs and new species added to each of the hot spots. (a) Density of CFUs. (b) Diversity of CFUs. (a) depicts the differences in the density of CFUs between the AMW and no AMW conditions for each “hot spot”. At each “hot spot,” there were fewer overall CFUs in the AMW cases compared to those where the AMW was not employed. Likewise, there are fewer additional bacterial species added to the individual hot spots, suggesting that the AMW was protective against contamination of the anesthesia machine from previous patients cared for, likely by preventing the anesthesia provider from serving as a vector. To account for multiple testing, nominal unadjusted values, Bonferroni-adjusted values, and FDR q values are presented. CFUs = colony forming units; AMW = anesthesia machine wrap; fdr = false discovery rate q value; bon = Bonferroni-adjusted value; nom = nominal value; ; ∗ = p < 0.05; ∗∗ = p < 0.01; ns = not significant ().

(a)

(b)