Baby bottle steam sterilizers disinfect home nebulizers inoculated with bacterial respiratory pathogens

BackgroundContaminated nebulizers are a potential source of bacterial infection but no single method is universally accepted for disinfection. We hypothesized that baby-bottle steam sterilizers effectively disinfect home nebulizers.MethodsHome nebulizers were inoculated with the common CF respiratory pathogens methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus, Burkholderia cepacia, Haemophilus influenzae, mucoid and non mucoid Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Stenotrophomonas maltophilia. The nebulizers were swabbed for bacterial growth, treated with either the AVENT (Philips), the NUK Quick & Ready (Gerber) or DRY-POD (Camera Baby) baby bottle steam sterilizer and reswabbed for bacterial growth.ResultsAll steam sterilizers were effective at disinfecting all home nebulizers. Viable bacteria were not recovered from any inoculated site after steam treatment, under any conditions tested.ConclusionsSteam treatment is an effective disinfection method. Additional studies are needed to confirm whether these results are applicable to the clinical setting.