Virginia Research Day 2022

Medical Student Research Cl inical

04 Changes In Disinfectant Use Due To Covid-19 In Hospitals Located In Illinois And Arizona

Rashad Abdallah 1 , Brooke Poe 1 , Karen W. Price 1 , Sara Safford 1 , Madeleine Chew 1 , Theresa J McCann 1 , Terry C Hrubec 1 Corresponding author: rabdallah@vt.vcom.edu

VCOM Virginia

exposure to disinfectants, specifically QACs, has increased since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. This study is working in congruence with an adjacent study that is surveying hospitals in Florida, Pennsylvania, and Michigan which are also nationally representative states. Together, these efforts will provide a picture of overall changes in disinfectant practices nationally in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and may help to understand possible adverse health outcomes to hospital personnel in the future.

Arizona to better understand how disinfection practices have changed with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Illinois and Arizona are representative of the US, having the median score when all states were ranked on 29 separate health metrics. Survey questions are a combination of multiple choice and open-ended questions. Questions determine the hospitals’ general disinfectant use and usage in wards with increased numbers of potentially immunocompromised patients, such as labor and delivery and intensive care units (ICUs). Descriptive statistics with means and proportions will be used to describe the data. Paired t-tests or non-parametric equivalents will be used to compare changes in disinfection practices. All analyses will be 2-tailed with statistical significance set at p<0.05, and 95% confidence intervals will be provided for outcomes. We hypothesized that the use and

Disinfection is necessary in hospital settings to prevent spread of diseases; however, it results in exposure of healthcare workers and patients to the disinfectants used. Of particular interest are Quaternary Ammonium Compounds (QACs), a group of chemicals present in many disinfectants used in healthcare settings. QACs have recently been shown in animal models to alter immune function, reduce fertility, and have teratogenic effects. These effects may be mediated by proinflammatory cytokines, decreased mitochondrial function and impaired sterol biosynthetic pathways. All of these pathways are affected in a dose-dependent manner with QAC concentration in chronically exposed individuals. Thus, exposure in humans may be of concern, especially due to increased indoor exposure to QAC compounds during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study will survey 400 hospitals of various sizes within Illinois and

This project is IRB-exempt and was funded in part by VCOM.

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