Surgeons and CDC form alliance to prevent SSIs
Surgeons and CDC form alliance to prevent SSIs
A joint, strategic partnership to improve surgical patient safety at the national level has been announced by leaders of the American College of Surgeons (ACS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). At the core of the alliance is combining expertise and organizational resources in tracking, reporting, and preventing surgical site infections (SSIs) and other adverse outcomes among surgical patients.
The ACS National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (ACS NSQIP) and the CDC's National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, Division of Health Care Quality Promotion (DHQP), will form a working group to jointly develop and maintain measures of SSIs and infectious and noninfectious complications that affect surgical patients. The work group will build upon the portfolio of SSI measures developed jointly by ACS and CDC in 2010 for abdominal hysterectomy and colon operations. These measures are now in place as part of Medicare quality reporting programs.
"Partnering with the CDC speaks to our shared commitment to surgical patient safety, preventing complications, and lowering costs," said David B. Hoyt, MD, FACS, executive director of the American College of Surgeons.
A key objective of the new ACS-CDC collaboration is to harmonize and maintain the ACS NSQIP and CDC's National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) definitions, data requirements, and technical specifications to allow data transfers from ACS NSQIP to NHSN, yet still maintain the individuality of each reporting system. The ACS and CDC will explore ways to maximize the use of electronic health records (EHRs) for collecting and submitting standard SSI measure data and other data to aggregating systems, namely ACS NSQIP and CDC's NHSN.
Clifford Y. Ko, MD, FACS, director of the ACS Division of Research and Optimal Patient Care, which administers ACS NSQIP, said, "It's clear that our national health system is seeking better ways to measure quality care. Better data makes it possible because it creates more opportunities to improve the care hospitals and providers offer their patients.
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