New treatment of some chronic tension states.

nurses. The rate of transmission was between 6 and 10% to 158 newborns cared for in such a way that organisms from infant carriers could be transmitted to them only via the airborne route. In contrast, 126 infants who were handled by nurses who also handled the neighbouring carrier babies with little or no handwashing exhibited a 43 % rate of acquisition of the carrier strains. A careful hexachlorophane wash of the hands of the nurses who cared for the carriers decreased the transmission rate to 14 %. The carrier strains were often recovered from settling-plates exposed throughout the special nursery. It is concluded that under ordinary circumstances airborne organisms probably account for only a small proportion of staphylococcal transmission in the nursery, and that efficient handwashing techniques can reduce staphylococcal spread appreciably. This investigation was conducted under the sponsorship of the Commission on Streptococcal and Staphylococcal Diseases, Armed Forces Epidemiological Board, and was supported by the Office of the Surgeon General, Department of the Army, Washington, D.C., and United States Public Health Service Training Grant No. 2E-1 80. The Department of Nursing of Cleveland Metropolitan General Hospital co-operated in this investigation, and Mrs. Dorothy Simon and Miss Barbara Brady provided technical assistance. Mrs. Donna Hines, R.N., supervised the special nurses.