Call for cancer patients to be cared for in single rooms

CANCER patients should be cared for in single en suite rooms because of their increased vulnerability to healthcare-associated infections, medical experts insisted yesterday.

A new position published yesterday by the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (RCPI) calls for the inclusion of single rooms in the strategic planning of cancer services in Ireland.

Chairman of the RCPI policy group, Prof Hilary Humphreys, said between five and 10% of patients admitted to hospitals develop a healthcare-associated infection, with cancer patients at the higher end of the scale.

“Not only are cancer patients more likely to get an infection, but when they do get an infection, they are more likely to have an unfavourable outcome because of the fact that their defences have been impaired, either by the underlying cancer or the treatment of the cancer,” he said.

Consultant oncologist, Prof Peter Daly, said that it was highly likely that at least one in 10 cancer patients on intensive chemotherapy treatment would acquire a healthcare-associated infection. Such patients are already weakened by the disease; were having to undergo intensive treatment and were lying in bed all day.

“Not only do we need good facilities, we need ancillary treatments like physiotherapy and occupational therapy. All these things improve what we call patient performance status – in other words, how they live their daily lives,” he said.

About 20,000 patients in Ireland develop cancer each year and it is estimated that one in two of the population will develop some form of cancer by 2020. Currently, it is reckoned that one in three people will develop cancer during their lifetime.

Prof Humphreys said there had been improvements in the prevention of the spread of healthcare-associated infections in Irish acute hospitals but Ireland remained near the bottom of the European league in terms of the proportion of bloodstream infections due to MRSA, compared to the Netherlands or Norway.

He stressed that investment in the area of cancer care was cost-effective.

“We’ve got to continue to invest in areas of the health service that will not only improve patient care but will actually save money,” he said.