Some clinical advances are the result of new science or new technology. Some, such as preventing infections from central lines, depend more on education and retraining. But that doesn’t mean it is easy.
“The culture change is actually the hardest part,” says Robert Taylor, MD, Chief Medical Officer at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, an Ascension Health hospital in Binghamton, New York. Lourdes, as it is known locally, has dropped its rate of catheter-related bloodstream infections dramatically by reliably implementing the Central Line Bundle, one of the six interventions in IHI’s 100,000 Lives Campaign. Using this protocol of five essential elements in central line management, Lourdes has routinely gone well past its initial goal of 90 days without an infection. “We are currently at 178 days, which is our record,” says Jill Patak, RN, Quality Engineering Specialist.
“The big advantage of the bundle is that it is tried and true,” says Taylor. “You implement it and you get results.” And those results fuel the culture change. “When you have local evidence that this is working, you have a very powerful argument that silences a lot of skeptics.” And providers who wonder if all the elements are necessary every time for every patient are advised to ask themselves, “Which element would I leave out if this were my mother?”
01/16/2006
