Today's hospitals are operating in an increasingly complex and challenging environment. Factors such as the weakened economy, cuts in Medicare reimbursement, and the growing uninsured population are whittling away at already paper-thin operating margins.
At the same time that hospitals are seeking ways to economize, they must make investments to improve patient care, maximize revenues, and remain competitive. Throughout the United States, hospitals are competing against each other for paying patients that are in need of the most lucrative procedures. The rise in specialty or “boutique” hospitals, the growth in capital projects, and investments in both clinical and information technologies are testaments to this trend.
Opportunity: Infection Control
Infection control presents a significant opportunity for hospitals to both reduce costs and gain a competitive edge in the marketplace. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) account for an estimated 1.7 million infections and 99,000 associated deaths each year. These infections add an estimated $5 billion to the nation's annual healthcare bill.1
In an effort to reduce HAIs and enhance patient safety, Medicare has ceased reimbursing healthcare facilities for the increased costs of treating certain preventable infections.2 Compounding the issue, many private insurers have expressed their intentions of following suit. Since hospitals are now responsible for absorbing the added costs of treating these patients, it is in their best interest to reduce HAIs.
In addition to reducing costs, infection control presents the opportunity for healthcare facilities to increase revenue. With the consumer-driven healthcare movement in full swing, patients are becoming educated consumers when it comes to the care that they choose for themselves and their families.
“I received a call from a patient who was shopping around for a total hip replacement and his criteria for choosing a hospital was based on the facility's infection rates,” says Maureen Spencer, MEd, RN, Infection Control Manager at the New England Baptist Hospital in Boston. “We are seeing more educated consumers who are petrified of acquiring infections.”
Consumers also have more access to information as they “shop around”-many states have implemented, or are in the process of implementing, HAI public reporting mandates enabling consumers to view a hospital's infection rates via the Internet. As a result, facilities that implement innovative infection control practices and reduce infection rates can differentiate themselves from competing institutions and attract patients.
Challenges to effective infection prevention
Studies have shown that surfaces in healthcare facilities-from countertops to privacy curtains-serve as fomites, which are inanimate objects capable of harboring and transmitting infectious disease causing organisms, including Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), which is responsible for 63% of hospital-acquired staph infections.3
Recent findings on contamination of healthcare surfaces include:
MRSA survives for 11 days on a plastic patient chart, more than 12 days on a laminated countertop, and nine days on a cloth curtain.4
In an investigation of contaminated room door handles in a university hospital setting, 27% of door handles were contaminated by MRSA or methicillin-sensitive Staphylococcus aureus (MSSA).5
In a hospital culture survey, 42% of hospital privacy curtains were contaminated with Vancomycin-Resistant Enterococcus (VRE) and 22% with MRSA.6
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