AHRQ awards $34M for infection prevention measures
The Department of Health and Human Services’ Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality has awarded $34 million for projects focused on preventing healthcare-associated infections.
The funding is designed to help improve the quality of care delivered to patients and expand the fight against HAIs in hospitals, ambulatory care settings, end-stage renal disease facilities and long-term care facilities.
Based on estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there are nearly 2 million HAIs in hospitals each year, which contribute to almost 100,000 deaths. Officials say they don't have enough information on infections originating in other healthcare settings.
"We know that infections can occur in any healthcare setting," said Carolyn M. Clancy, MD, the AHRQ's director. “With these new projects, we can apply what has worked in reducing infections in hospitals to other settings and ultimately help patients feel confident they are in safe hands, regardless of where they receive care.”
With the dramatic growth in surgery being performed in ambulatory surgical centers and a rise in the number of surgery centers in the United States over the last two decades – from 336 in 1985 to 5,047 in 2007 – officials say it's critical to ensure safe practices in these settings, particularly since federal inspections have identified breaches in standard practices to prevent infections in more than 60 percent of ASCs.
The AHRQ's new projects are also focusing on end-stage renal disease and long-term care facilities because their more than 500,000 patients and 1.5 million residents, respectively, are particularly vulnerable to infections.
To maximize the impact of the HAI investment, the AHRQ has collaborated with the CDC, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and the National Institutes of Health to identify research gaps to improve HAI prevention. With this funding, researchers will be able to address some of these gaps, learn why infections occur, find ways to prevent them from happening, improve antibiotic prescribing practices and delivery and enhance communication and teamwork among healthcare providers.
