VRE precautions: preventing the spread of VRE
VRE spreads by contact, not through the air, so the precautions that work are practical ones. Everyone in a healthcare setting — patients, visitors, nurses, doctors, and cleaners — plays a part in stopping vancomycin-resistant enterococci from reaching the next person.
Hand hygiene comes first
Hands are the main route VRE travels. Clean them before and after touching a patient, after using the toilet, before eating, and after touching medical equipment. Alcohol-based rub works well for most situations; soap and water is preferred after using the toilet or when hands are visibly dirty.
Contact precautions and PPE
VRE is managed with contact precautions rather than airborne ones — no mask or negative-pressure room is needed for VRE alone. A patient known to carry or be infected with VRE may be given a single room, or share a room with another VRE patient. Staff and visitors put on gloves and a gown before entering, remove them before leaving, and clean their hands on the way out.
Equipment and cleaning
Enterococci survive for long periods on surfaces, so items such as blood pressure cuffs, thermometers and stethoscopes are ideally dedicated to one patient or disinfected between uses. Bed rails, call buttons, table tops and bathroom surfaces are cleaned more often in a room under VRE precautions.
Antibiotic stewardship
Using antibiotics only when needed, choosing the right drug at the right dose, and stopping unnecessary broad-spectrum antibiotics all help slow the development of resistance in the first place.
VRE precautions for patients and visitors
- Ask healthcare workers to clean their hands before examining you or a loved one.
- Wear the gloves and gown provided if the room is signed for contact precautions, and take them off before you leave.
- Wash your own hands before eating, after using the bathroom, and on the way out of the room.
- Keep wounds clean and covered, and report any redness, swelling, or drainage promptly.
- Avoid sitting on the patient's bed or sharing their personal items.
- Do not insist on antibiotics for viral illnesses such as colds or flu.
- Finish every antibiotic prescription exactly as directed.
- Tell your care team if you have been hospitalized or treated abroad.
Precautions usually continue for as long as the hospital's infection control team advises. At home, ordinary hand washing, laundry and cleaning are generally enough — healthy household members with intact skin are at very low risk.