Protective Effect of HEPA-Filtered Operating Room Air Ventilation With or Without Laminar Airflow on Surgical Site Infections

摘要

As Dr. Assadian and colleagues state in their concluding phrase, the matter of OR ventilation is still an unresolved issue. In Germany, LAF has been a subject of ongoing controversy, especially in the context of discussion of German technical standard DIN 1946-4. In the 2008 revision, the Standards Committee proposed use of large LAF ceilings as standard not only for joint prosthesis surgery, but also for a large number of surgical procedures, without providing any evidence for a preventive effect on the surgical site infection (SSI) outcome. The publication of our study in a clinical journal has certainly made this topic transparent for many surgeons.