AMA Awards 2006 the MJA Wyeth Award
The eleventh The Medical Journal of Australia/Wyeth Australia award for the best original research published in the Medical Journal of Australia was awarded during the opening ceremony of the AMA National Conference in Adelaide today.
The Journal's Content Review Committee has awarded the prize for work conducted in 2005 to Associate Professor Paul Johnson and his colleagues: Rhea Martin, Laurelle Burrell, Elizabeth Grabsch, Susan Kirsa, Jason O'Keeffe, Barrie Mayall, Deidre Edmonds, Wendy Barr, Christopher Bolger, Humsha Naidoo and Lindsay Grayson.
Their winning research paper - "Efficacy of an alcohol/ chlorhexidine hand hygiene program in a hospital with high rates of nosocomial methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infection" - was published in The Medical Journal of Australia on 21 November 2005.
The team's research addressed a problem that has plagued hospital practice since the 19th century - nosocomial infection.
The problem has become more deadly with the recent emergence of methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA).
In the tradition of the 19th Century Swiss doctor Ignaz Semmelweis, who reduced the incidence of puerperal sepsis by insisting that doctors wash their hands, Dr Johnson and his team have introduced a multi-faceted hand hygiene program at Austin Health in Melbourne.
Through their persistence and tenacity, Dr Johnson and his colleagues produced better hand hygiene by hospital staff, and a reduction in hospital-wide MRSA isolates, simply by using an alcohol/chlorhexidine solution.
The judges said their research clearly illustrates that making meaningful advances does not necessarily require high technology, but rather, a will and commitment to change human behaviour.