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Explore by Interest

Use Explore by Interest to delve more deeply into the content on IHI.org in multiple ways: by Topic, Care Setting, Role or Profession, or IHI Offering. Content is gathered from across the site to present a more comprehensive view of available resources:

  • Knowledge Center: Tools, change ideas, measures, audio and video, and other resources to help you make improvements in a specific area
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Mentor Registry

Get advice and clinical expertise from hospitals that have volunteered to help others with implementation efforts in these topic areas:

Catheter-Associated UTI
MRSA
Surgical Site Infection
You are here: Home > Explore by Interest > Healthcare-Associated Infections

Healthcare-Associated Infections

Healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) can be serious and even deadly for patients. Those who access the health care system for illness or injury are expecting care and treatment, not additional illness and complications, yet the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 1 in 20 hospitalized patients develop an HAI. Treatment of HAIs can be difficult and may last for years, especially when the organism is resistant to multiple antibiotics. In addition to the human burden, excess costs are incurred across the health care system and many patients and payors are no longer willing to accept these avoidable costs.

 

Transmission of organisms that cause HAIs can occur in many ways: caregiver-to-patient, environment-to-patient, or patient-to-patient. Programs that have been successful in reducing HAIs have made this a strategic imperative and generally focused on improving multiple interventions, such as hand hygiene, use of contact and other precautions, active screening, and robust decontamination rather than relying on a single approach.

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  • Changes to Prevent Healthcare-Associated Infections
    Organizations must test and implement changes to existing processes in order to prevent healthcare-associated infections (HAIs).
  • How-to Guide: Improving Hand Hygiene
    This How-to Guide is designed to help organizations reduce healthcare-associated infections, including infections due to antibiotic-resistant organisms, by improving hand hygiene practices and use of gloves among health care workers.
  • How-to Guide: Prevent Catheter-Associated Urinary Tract Infection
    This How-to Guide describes key evidence-based care components for preventing catheter-associated urinary tract infections, describes how to implement these interventions, and recommends measures to gauge improvement.
  • How-to Guide: Reduce MRSA Infection
    This How-to Guide describes key evidence-based care components for reducing methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections, describes how to implement these interventions, and recommends measures to gauge improvement.

Getting Started: How to Improve

Learn about the Model for Improvement, forming the improvement team, setting aims, establishing measures, and selecting and testing changes. Go to How to Improve.
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  • IHI Severe Sepsis Bundles
    The Severe Sepsis Bundles include the Severe Sepsis 3-Hour Rescuscitation Bundle and the 6-Hour Septic Shock Bundle. The Severe Sepsis Bundles have been revised in conjunction with the updated 2012 International Guidelines for Management of Severe Sepsis and Septic Shock.
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  • Remeasure Lactate If Initial Lactate Was Elevated Goal
    Compliance with this element in the Severe Sepsis Bundles (as part of the 6-Hour Septic Shock Bundle) is defined as the percent of patients following septic shock or lactate ≥4 mmol/L (36 mg/dl) identification for whom the lactate was repeated during the first 6 hours after presentation.
  • Compliance with Severe Sepsis Bundles (with the Goal of Reducing Mortality)
    Measuring compliance with the Severe Sepsis Bundles will allow your team to judge how well your institution is performing in achieving the goal of 100 percent compliance with all Severe Sepsis Bundles elements.
  • IHI Severe Sepsis Bundles
    The Severe Sepsis Bundles include the Severe Sepsis 3-Hour Rescuscitation Bundle and the 6-Hour Septic Shock Bundle. The Severe Sepsis Bundles have been revised in conjunction with the updated 2012 International Guidelines for Management of Severe Sepsis and Septic Shock.
  • Reliability: Severe Sepsis Bundles
    The percent of cases of severe sepsis and/or septic shock for whom all applicable Severe Sepsis Bundles elements are completed.
  • WIHI: No Excuses, No Slack! The Latest from the Front Lines on Hand Hygiene
    March 7, 2013 | This WIHI discusses recent innovations in hand hygiene with experts from facilities that have had success in achieving nearly universal compliance.
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