Behind one hospital's fight against deadly infection

Marita Nash, environmental services director at Hunterdon Medical Center and her colleague Kathy Roye-Horn, Hunterdon's infection-prevention director, are on the front lines of one of the most critical battles in health care—keeping virulent hospital infections at bay. Besides increased diligence, the Hunterdon team is mobilizing new technologies, including bathing patient rooms with germ-killing ultraviolet light. Specialized computer software tracks new outbreaks of infection. And a new generation of powerful disinfectant products are used to kill even some of the most potent germs, especially Clostridium difficile, or C. diff, which is linked to some 14,000 U.S. deaths a year.