Can my child get the infection during admission to neonatal unit or ICU?
Controversy still surrounds the issue of whether hospital personnel are at risk for acquiring CMV infection and also transmit it to the patients. Some investigators have suggested that hospital personnel are at slightly higher risk for seroconversion than are age-matched controls that did not have patient contact. In a study to investigate the risk of patient-to- staff CMV transmission, Balfour and Balfour compared CMV infection rates in three groups of nurses 1. Those who were working in neonatal ICUs 2. Those who were working in renal transplant/dialysis units 3. The student nurses They did this with age-matched blood donors and found that there was no association between prevalence of infection among patients and CMV seroconversion It has been observed that because of the high norms of professional hygiene, there is significant protection against what might seem to be equally close contact with secretions such as urine and blood products from infected patients. Can CMV live for long
