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Ventilator associated pneumonia (VAP) rates have dropped significantly in a level II adult neuro/trauma unit at Essentia Health System in Duluth, MN, largely as a result of the unit following this six-step intervention:
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The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) controversial plan to survey the nation's hospital infection control programs is drawing fire for both going beyond its regulatory authority in some areas and not mandating more specific infection prevention resources in others.
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Increasingly common across the health care landscape, construction and renovation can make patient safety challenging. The need to expand facilities or upgrade existing space creates dust and particles that can easily become aerosolized, potentially transporting infectious Aspergillus and other fungal and bacterial organisms toward vulnerable patient populations.
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Infectious disease societies frustrated at watching antimicrobial resistance increase for decades are taking the unusual step of asking for federal regulation and oversight of clinical practice, imploring the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to require hospitals to implement antimicrobial stewardship programs.
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A new multicenter study shows that antimicrobial stewardship expressed as a post-prescription review and feedback intervention can decrease antimicrobial use, especially when it's part of an established antimicrobial program.
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Investigators evaluating more than 240 patients over a three-month period found that infectious diseases (ID) physicians correctly identified patients who did not need to be discharged on community-based parenteral anti-infective therapy (CoPAT).
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Norovirus is the organism most likely to trigger a shutdown of units in your hospital. And according to a recent survey of infection preventionists, it is responsible for more outbreaks than some deadlier organisms, such as Clostridium difficile and Staphylococcus aureus.
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In yet another sign that infection control is becoming a national priority across a wide range of accreditors, regulators and state and federal agencies, the Joint Commission has created a new web portal to combine its full array of initiatives to prevent health care associated infections (HAIs).
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In addition to calling for federal regulation requiring antimicrobial stewardship, a position paper by leading infectious disease groups recommended several other measures to preserve remaining antibiotic efficacy.
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The question of gown use when entering patient isolation rooms is a recurrent one, so it is worth noting that this is the current thinking of the Joint Commission on the subject:
