On July 17th, Catarina Marques successfully defended her PhD thesis entitled “Infection Prevention and Control in a Portuguese Long-term Healthcare Unit – an ongoing challenge against Antimicrobial Resistance”, at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto.

Under the supervision of researchers Helena Ferreira, from the Faculty of Pharmacy of the University of Porto, and Sónia Gonçalves Pereira, from ciTechCare, the doctoral project demonstrated that multidrug-resistant bacteria and antimicrobial resistance genes are widely disseminated in the long-term care unit under study, contaminating surfaces, the air, and colonizing patients. This represents a real risk to patients and healthcare professionals, highlighting that healthcare units cannot be overlooked in the context of epidemiological surveillance.

Infection prevention and control measures—especially those focused on the environment, such as environmental cleaning and disinfection—also contributed to controlthe spread of these pathogens, according to the prospective study conducted. The findings also revealed that infection prevention and control actions, with an emphasis on professional training and the empowerment of healthcare professionals in executing and coordinating these activities, are essential to ensure the effective implementation of such measures.

This is the second PhD thesis defended by a ciTechCare research fellow since the beginning of 2025.

Join us in congratulating ciTechCare’s newest PhD graduate on reaching such an important and meaningful milestone.