Suction Regulators: A Potential Vector for Hospital-Acquired Pathogens

June 12, 2017

Keith S. Kaye, MD, MPH; Dror Marchaim, MD; Chester Smialowicz, MD; Lauren Bentley, MSBME

Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology 2010, 31(7), 772-774.

The role of suction regulators in nosocomial infections has, to our knowledge, not been studied. A sampling of devices used in hospitals was conducted. Many regulators (173 [37%] of 470) were found to be colonized. A suction circuit model revealed that pathogens can disseminate throughout the circuit (retrograde and antegrade), colonizing an experimental patient’s stomach.

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