A compendium of strategies to prevent healthcare-associated infections in acute care hospitals.
Preventable healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) occur in US hospitals. Preventing these infections is a national priority, with initiatives led by healthcare organizations, professional associations, government and accrediting agencies, legislators, regulators, payers, and consumer advocacy groups. To assist acute care hospitals in focusing and prioritizing efforts to implement evidence-based practices for prevention of HAIs, the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America and the Infectious Diseases Society of America Standards and Practice Guidelines Committee appointed a task force to create a concise compendium of recommendations for the prevention of common HAIs. This compendium is implementation focused and differs from most previously published guidelines in that it highlights a set of basic HAI prevention strategies plus special approaches for use in locations and/or populations within the hospital when infections are not controlled by use of basic practices, recommends that accountability for implementing infection prevention practices be assigned to specific groups and individuals, and includes proposed performance measures for internal quality improvement efforts.
Yokoe
Deborah S
DS
Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Mermel
Leonard A
LA
Anderson
Deverick J
DJ
Arias
Kathleen M
KM
Burstin
Helen
H
Calfee
David P
DP
Coffin
Susan E
SE
Dubberke
Erik R
ER
Fraser
Victoria
V
Gerding
Dale N
DN
Griffin
Frances A
FA
Gross
Peter
P
Kaye
Keith S
KS
Klompas
Michael
M
Lo
Evelyn
E
Marschall
Jonas
J
Nicolle
Lindsay
L
Pegues
David A
DA
Perl
Trish M
TM
Podgorny
Kelly
K
Saint
Sanjay
S
Salgado
Cassandra D
CD
Weinstein
Robert A
RA
Wise
Robert
R
Classen
David
D
D003428:Cross Infection / Q000517:prevention & control*; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D006761:Hospitals / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D017053:Infection Control / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards / Q000639:trends