Figure 4. A single-occupancy room in the new hospital building of the Erasmus MC. Impact of single-occupancy rooms The transition to 100% single-occupancy rooms was expected to have positive effects, among others on infection prevention and control (IPC). For example, research has shown that transitioning from two-person to single-occupancy rooms on an ICU decreased the number of patient transfers with 90%, and the number of medication errors with 67% (12). Other studies have found comparable effects on medication errors (13). Additionally, singleoccupancy rooms are expected to improve patient sleep and social support, and potentially decrease the length of stay (11-13). The relocation to the new building of the Erasmus MC provided the unique opportunity to determine the effect of transitioning to single-occupancy rooms on different aspects. For this purpose, the board of directors of the Erasmus MC funded the consortium Program Evaluating – Our New Erasmus (PE-ONE), which aimed to determine the transition to 100% single-occupancy rooms from a multidisciplinary point of view. PE-ONE consisted of three pillars: CHANGE, which looked at the transition from the old to the new building from a management point of view, WELCOME, which looked at experiences from patients and staff and evaluating work situations and efficiency, and MOVE, which looked at the effect of single-occupancy rooms on the microbial safety. The latter was subject of this thesis. MOVE study; microorganisms in the environment of single- and multipleoccupancy rooms The aim of the MOVE study was determining the effect of transitioning from an old hospital building with multiple-occupancy rooms and shared bathrooms to a newly constructed hospital building with single-occupancy rooms and private bathrooms on the microbial safety. We hypothesized that single-occupancy rooms would provide a microbial safer environment for patients compared to multiple-occupancy rooms (14). We define the environment of the new hospital microbial safer when the environmental contamination in 12 Chapter 1
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