The Opportunity
Despite being largely preventable, healthcare-associated infections (HAIs), including hospital-onset bacteremia and fungemia (HOB), a bacterial or fungal infection of the bloodstream, are a longstanding concern among hospitals. HAIs result in about 72,000 annual deaths1 and have an estimated direct medical cost of $28.4 billion per year.2 An estimated 633,300 patients contract HAIs each year, a situation that has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.3 Hospitals’ infection prevention efforts have focused primarily on procedure- or device-related infections. By contrast, using an HOB outcome measure broadens the scope of infections being tracked and reduces the adjudication burden on the front-line clinicians.
About the Project
NQF will develop an implementation guide for acute care hospitals to support efforts to prevent HOB. The guide is intended to be used as a “playbook” for clinicians and hospital staff in their efforts to reduce avoidable infections contributing to HOB and offer best practices on isolation and treatment of the pathogen when HOB does occur. The guide is anticipated to be completed in mid-2024. This project is made possible by funding from Becton Dickinson (BD).
Contact Information
For more information, please contact the project team at PreventHOB@qualityforum.org.
1
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) HAI Data Portal. https://www.cdc.gov/hai/data/portal/index.html. Last accessed September, 2023.
2
Scott, Douglas R. The Direct Medical Costs of Healthcare-Associated Infections in U.S. Hospitals and the Benefits of Prevention. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); 2009. https://www.cdc.gov/hai/pdfs/hai/scott_costpaper.pdf. Last accessed September 2023.
3
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) HAI Data Portal: COVID-19 Impact on HAIs. https://www.cdc.gov/hai/data/portal/covid-impact-hai.html. Last accessed September 2023.