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I N F E C T I O N
P R E V E N T I O N
3. Standardize your skin
preps as much as possible
Even in the absence of definitive studies, it makes sense to try to standardize your prep by type of surgery. For instance, for orthopedic procedures, where the No. 1 goal is to keep microorganisms on your skin
to a minimum to try to prevent SSIs, there's a lot of information and a
fair amount of evidence in favor of chlorhexidine and alcohol prep. So
you might decide to use that exclusively, with either wipes or baths,
when prepping for orthopedic procedures. Really, with orthopedics,
that has become pretty standard — almost a no-brainer.
It's when you look at abdominal and colon and other types of surgery that some disagreement arises. Some doctors do say, it's not the
skin flora I'm worried about. And there have been studies in clean-
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