A fingertip-to-fingertip intraindividual transmission experiment was carried out in 30 healthy volunteers, using four MLST-typed Enterococcus faecium clones. Overall results showed an adequate fit goodness to a theoretical exponential model, whereas four volunteers (13%) exhibited a significantly higher finger-to-finger bacterial transmission efficiency. This observation might have deep consequences in nosocomial epidemiology.
Keywords: Bacterial transmission; enterococcal clones; hand hygiene..
© 2014 The Authors. MicrobiologyOpen published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.