gms | German Medical Science

GMS Hygiene and Infection Control

Deutsche Gesellschaft für Krankenhaushygiene (DGKH)

ISSN 2196-5226

GMS Hygiene and Infection Control

Editorial

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  • corresponding author Axel Kramer - Institute of Hygiene and Environmental Medicine, University Medicine Greifswald, Germany
  • author Ojan Assadian - Clinical Institute for Hospital Hygiene, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna General Hospital, Vienna, Austria
  • author Wolfgang Kohnen - Hospital Hygiene of the University Medical Center Mainz, Germany

GMS Hyg Infect Control 2013;8(1):Doc13

doi: 10.3205/dgkh000213, urn:nbn:de:0183-dgkh0002135

Published: April 29, 2013

© 2013 Kramer et al.
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Editorial

Since 2006, the German Society for Hospital Hygiene patronages the Journal “GMS (German Medical Science) Krankenhaushygiene Interdisziplinär”, an open access peer-reviewed PubMed listed e-journal. German Medical Science is a portal for online journals, meeting and research reports and offers all researchers in the field of medicine an open access to scientific articles and the possibility to publish their research results online.

The journal “GMS Krankenhaushygiene Interdisziplinär” was founded to foster both, understanding and practice in the field of infection control. The Journal provides a forum for continuing exchange of information and opinions through contributions from scholars, professionals, policymakers, and others involved in infection control. Although the field of Infection Control is a dedicated medical speciality on its own rights, as other medical and surgical specialities as well, Infection Control is maybe unique in one aspect: Very few other medical disciplines have to be so much involved into the complete spectrum of medical treatment, diagnostics, and preventive aspects. There is not one single medical field, where an infection may not be present or may not be a known complication. Furthermore, healthcare associated infections are not restricted to one single hospital, one single region, country, or continent, but are a global challenge.

The Journal specifically emphasises on a multidisciplinary approach aiming at collaboration with other medical societies at a higher level. Since 2008, the journal is PubMed-listed. It can be accessed at the web address http://www.egms.de/en/journals/dgkh/.

In light of this discipline’s enormous scope, it is not surprising that Infection Control related research is published in almost all categories of medical literature. Papers with Infection Control related content are found as lead articles in general medical, internal medicine, general surgical, urological, vascular surgical, and many more journals. Aside of this a number of high-impact dedicated Infection Control journals do exist.

This realises the question, why a journal such as “GMS Krankenhaushygiene Interdisziplinär” is needed. There are at least two reasons:

Firstly, a number of authors from German speaking countries have frequently made the experience how difficult it is to publish epidemiologic data relevant for Infection Control aspects in Germany, Austria, or Switzerland in international journals, mostly dominated by US or British publishers. Indeed, some Infection Control aspects related to German or Austrian federal laws are of importance there, but US readers may correctly ask what the relevance of such articles is to them. Therefore, a “local” Infection Control Journal is needed to serve as platform to share important “local” information. An example of this is an article published in this issue of the journal which reports important data on infrastructure of German hospitals and institutions caring for elderly in- and outpatients [1].

Secondly, as highlighted, the scope of Infection Control is so broad, that some important articles on very rare, rather unusual, or extremely selective aspects may not be publishable, simply because they do not fall into any category of existing journals. One example for this is an article which explores the practice of none-replacement of i.v. administration sets after each change of intermittently administrated antibiotic infusions [2].

The Journal was given the name “GMS Krankenhaushygiene Interdisziplinär”, which means translated interdisciplinary hospital hygiene, because Infection Control still is focused very much on hospitals, and because of the multimodal, multidisciplinary approach of the field. Since the term “Hospital Hygiene” is specifically used and known in German and French speaking countries, but not in other regions, the editors and the publisher have decided to change the journal’s name. From this first issue of the year 2013 onwards, the journal will be launched with a new title “GMS Hygiene and Infection Control”, again under patronage of the German Society for Hospital Hygiene and with the publisher “German Medical Science”. More importantly, the change of the Journal’s name considers the increasing international attention, underlined by the increasing number of international researcher groups submitting their work for publication, but also the increasing number of citation in other international medical journals. Furthermore, the new Journal’s name offered the opportunity to expand the editorial advisory board on a broader international level. This issue is published with inclusion of W. Kohnen as associate editor and a new editorial advisory board with members of France, Germany, Iran, Japan, Turkey, UK and US.

The focus of the present issue is set on the development of prevalence of multi-resistant bacteria in Germany, practical questions of hospital hygiene, the prediction of bacterial infectious risks and one article on antibiofilm efficacy of cold atmospheric pressure plasma.

Axel Kramer, Ojan Assadian and Wolfgang Kohnen


References

1.
Kramer A, Assadian O, Helfrich J, Krüger C, Pfenning I, Ryll S, Perner A, Loczenski B. Questionnaire-based survey on structural quality of hospitals and nursing homes for the elderly, their staffing with infection control personal, and implementation of infection control measures in Germany. GMS Hyg Infect Control. 2013;8(1):Doc11. DOI: 10.3205/dgkh000211 External link
2.
von Au F, Ryll S, Wegner C, Gessner S, Kramer A. Is routine replacement of i.v. administration sets required after each change of intermittently administrated antibiotic infusions? GMS Hyg Infect Control. 2013;8(1):Doc08. DOI: 10.3205/dgkh000208 External link