Effect of desquamation of facial skin during surgery.

Aseptic control of organisms in the operating arena has long been a major goal of surgeons. The purpose of this study was to assess the facial skin flora of operating room personnel and its relationship to contamination adjacent to the surgical site. The authors found that, in spite of all attempts at aseptic control, operating room personnel have numerous organisms on the exposed facial areas, and the same organisms appear on the operating room table adjacent to the surgical site of about one in five patients.

Intraoperative bacteremia during foot surgery.

Numerous studies have shown that bacteremias occur in patients during and immediately after some types of surgeries, placing the patient at risk of serious infection. This study was designed to ascertain whether a bacteremia will exist following routine podiatric surgery. Blood cultures were taken perioperatively from 42 subjects, and were incubated both aerobically and anaerobically, and swabs of the incision were made during the surgery. No bacteremias occurred during this study. This suggests that podiatric surgery, when properly performed, does not present a risk of bacteremia to the patient.