Father and son team up to fight hospital infections
Sometimes just the right misfortune besets just the right person. That's what happened 11 years ago when
Gene Gordon, then 66, contracted an infection in a hospital during a back operation. Inventor Gene Gordon,
right, and his son Peter Gordon have developed GloveGard, a medical exam glove sterilization device.
"Because of the infection I had to go back to the hospital for serious surgery," the physicist recalled,
as he sat before a model of GloveGard, a medical exam glove sterilization device he invented so millions of
patients do not have to suffer what he did. Or worse. It is a box and it works simply: A health care worker
inserts his gloved hand and spreads his fingers wide, allowing Ultraviolet C light to kill pathogens on the
glove. In three seconds, the gloves are sterilized. The virtues of the device are safety and speed.
Photo Courtesy of Eric Cahall / Daily Record
June 15, 2008
GloveGard kills lots of bacteria, including two of the most threatening:
-- Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, a skin infection that can enter bones, joints,
surgical wounds, the bloodstream, lungs and heart valves. It lives on fabrics, such as privacy curtains,
lab coats, uniforms and ties, as well as on uncoated endotracheal tubes, used by patients on ventilators.
-- Clostridium difficile, or C. diff, a bug that destroys the lining of the gut. C. diff is common in
health care settings, which treat many people with diarrhea.
The spores of the bacterium reside on bedrails, telephones, toilets, call buttons and
monitors. Unless removed or eradicated, a spore can thrive on a surface for three months, ready to become
an infection once it is ingested, inhaled or otherwise introduced to a human body. What happened to Gordon is
not rare. An estimated 1.7 million Americans acquire infections in hospitals every year, according to the
national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The infections are not trivial. A total of 99,000
Americans die from them annually. Neither are they cheap. Treatment costs $5.5 billion a year, according
to the Association for Professionals in Infection Control & Epidemiology.
That is one big problem. But Gordon has one big mind. He has a doctorate in physics from the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology and, as an inventor, 80 patents to his name. In 26 years at AT&T Bell Labs, he
developed the laser technologies behind long-haul fiber optic communication, digital camera and video
equipment, and a treatment that has restored sight for millions of diabetic retinopathy patients.
Gordon was more than ready to tackle the problem of stopping hospital infections. Using UVC for sterilizing
is nothing new. "But sterilizing gloved hands, that's our thing," he said. "What many people don't realize is
that health care workers wear gloves to protect themselves from the patient. While the surface of the
gloves is sterile, nominally, to begin with, it is contaminated as soon as the worker touches anything."
The three-second sterilization GloveGard accomplishes protects both doctors and patients, he said. Certainly
better than alcohol rubs, which he called good but not with spores, and hand washing, which removes but
doesn't kill pathogens. GloveGard, though, has a way to go before it is available to protect the public in
hospitals.
It is a product of Germgard Lighting, a company Gordon founded with his 45-year-old son, Peter Gordon of
Mendham, an engineer who left a sales career in semiconductors in Silicon Valley to join his dad. Their
big dream: to create a family of products to combat pathogens in medical and other settings. Just as
GloveGard can be used to protect hospital patients from C. diff, MRSA and other bacteria, other devices will be
used to protect restaurant patrons from E. coli, Peter Gordon said. Or cruise ship passengers from Norovirus,
schoolchildren from Picornavirus and Coronavirus (the common cold), and office workers from biothreats such
as anthrax. The U.S. Army Medical Command already expressed interest in Germgard's instrument sterilizer,
another work in progress. "Currently the Army carries around Vietnam-era autoclaves that are very big and
cumbersome. They take a lot of water, power and men to operate," Peter Gordon said. "They require a sterilizer
as light and portable as an attaché case so they can immediately operate on injured troops."
Because of the military application of the technology, Germgard Lighting is one of the 22 companies in the
Picatinny Technology Innovation Center in Rockaway Township, a business incubator on the Army base that
provides low-rent space and free used equipment to startups. The arrangement makes Germgard's existence
possible. As does an Edison Innovation R&D Fund grant from the New Jersey Commission on Science &
Technology. "One hundred companies or so occupy incubator space throughout New Jersey," Peter Gordon
said. "But there may be many more worthy companies that need available space to keep their overhead low."
Like every other pathogen-reduction product on the market -- from silver-coated endotracheal tubes to
disposable electrocardiogram lead wires -- GloveGard must be cleared by the Food and Drug Administration's
Center for Devices & Radiological Health. That hurdle is minimal compared to the $2 million required
to take the product through commercialization, for use by nurses. That reality has father and son seeking
funding from venture capital funds or a private investor, or a partnership with a larger corporation,
to get the ball rolling. "It's an incredible struggle," Gene Gordon said, "even with something which works and
is so important." The problem, experts seem to agree, will only get worse as more bacteria become more
resistant to more antibiotics. Products like GloveGard help, said Betsy McCaughey, president of the Committee
to Reduce Infection Deaths. But they are no replacement for health care workers following good cleanliness
practices at all times. "Research shows doctors fail to clean their hands more than half the time," she said.
But Gene and Peter Gordon concern themselves with their part -- creating a viable business around proven
science. They said Germgard is their way of doing good.