Healthcare-associated infections (HAIs), infections people get while they are receiving health care for another condition, are a threat to patient safety. HAIs are a significant cause of illness and death. They can lead to serious emotional and medical consequence and cost the U.S. health care system billions of dollars each year. At any given time, about 1 in 31 inpatients have an infection related to hospital care. HAI and a top priority the nation, and Wisconsin. (CDC HAI webpage, accessed March 2023,
https://www.cdc.gov/hai/data/portal/progress-report.html)
General HAI Resources
Resources:
AHRQ Road Map to Elimination (HAI Action Plan)
Provides a road map for preventing HAIs in acute care hospitals, ambulatory surgical centers, end-stage renal disease facilities, and long-term care facilities.
AHRQ Toolkit for Preventing CLABSI and CAUTI in ICUs
This customizable, educational toolkit aims to help ICUs reduce rates of central line-associated bloodstream infection (CLABSI) and catheter-associated urinary tract infection (CAUTI).
AHRQ Toolkit Introduction –Overview, Decision Making, and Recommended Prelaunch Activities
This toolkit will provide hospital infection prevention programs with instructions for implementing targeted decolonization in adult patients with medical devices in hospital units outside of intensive care (i.e., non-ICUs).
AHRQ Guide to Implementing and Sustaining a Program to Prevent CLABSI and CAUTI in the Intensive Care Unit Setting
The implementation guide will help your team be supported with resources to move through a program that enhances previous CUSP resources to reduce central line-associated bloodstream infection (CLABSI) and catheter-associated urinary tract infection (CAUTI) in the hospital setting, and introduces a new, tiered interventional approach designed to help overcome challenges with persistently elevated infection rates in the intensive care unit (ICU) setting. This guide identifies groups of resources to utilize throughout your journey to lower infections in your ICU. Since CLABSI and CAUTI will always be a potential threat to patient care in the ICUs, this guide is intended to support teams to create a structure to sustain safe patient care.
The implementation guide contains the following resources:
CDC Resources - Healthcare-associated Infections
- Types of Healthcare-associated Infections (HAIs)
- Patient Safety: What you can do to be a safe patient
- Containment Strategy: Responding to Emerging Antibiotic Resistance Threats
- Preventing HAIs
CDC-STRIVE Infection Control Training
The CDC/STRIVE curriculum was developed by national infection prevention experts led by the Health Research & Educational Trust (HRET) for CDC. Courses address both the technical and foundational elements of healthcare-associated infection (HAI) prevention. Courses can be taken in any order. Each course has 1 or more modules. Individual modules can be used for; new employee training, annual infection prevention training, and/or periodic training.
2023 National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN); Patient Safety Component Manual
The Patient Safety Component includes five modules that focus on events associated with medical devices, surgical procedures, antimicrobial agents used during healthcare, multidrug resistant organisms, and Coronavirus Infectious Disease 2019 (COVID-19).
National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) Analysis Training videos
This resource provides self-paced training videos and Quick Learn video’s on using the NHSN reporting application correctly
National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN)Patient Safety Analysis Resource
The NHSN application provides various options that allow NHSN users to analyze their surveillance data. The resources listed on the link above are intended to help you use the analysis tool, and interpret data analyzed from the Patient Safety Component of NHSN.
NHSN Patient Safety Analysis Quick Reference Guides
These quick reference guides were created to help you understand, modify, and interpret your data using the NHSN application’s various analysis output (report) options for the NHSN Patient Safety Component. These guides serve as companions to the “Introduction to NHSN Analysis” training slide set.
National Action Plan to Prevent Health Care-Associated Infections: Road Map to Elimination
Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion (ODPHP) HAI Prevention Resources
Catheter Associated Urinary Tract Infection (CAUTI)
Urinary tract infections (UTI) are the most common health care-associated infections, approximately 75% are associated with a urinary catheter. Nationally, among acute care hospitals, there was a 5% increase in CAUTI between 2020 and 2021 with the largest increase being in ICUs (9%)(CDC HAI webpage, accessed March 2023,
https://www.cdc.gov/hai/data/portal/progress-report.html)
Resources:
CDC-Guideline for Prevention of Catheter-Associated Urinary Tract Infections (CAUTI)
This document is intended for use by infection prevention staff, healthcare epidemiologists, healthcare administrators, nurses, other healthcare providers, and persons responsible for developing, implementing, and evaluating infection prevention and control programs for healthcare settings across the continuum of care. The guideline can also be used as a resource for societies or organizations that wish to develop more detailed implementation guidance for prevention of CAUTI.
CDC-TAP Catheter-Associated Urinary Tract Infection (CAUTI) Implementation Guide: Links to Example Resources
Examples and resources on implementing the CDC Targeted Assessment for Prevention (TAP) strategy to prevent CAUTI.
AHRQ Toolkit for Reducing CAUTI in Hospitals
The toolkit has evidence-based, practical resources that reflect the real-world experiences of the frontline providers and researchers who participated in a national implementation project to reduce CAUTIs. It builds on the core
CUSP toolkit by providing specific tools focused on reducing CAUTI in hospitals.
Central Line Associated Blood Stream Infection (CLABSI)
Central line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSI) are serious infections that occurs when germs such as bacteria or viruses enter the bloodstream through the central line. Nationally, among acute care hospitals, there was a 7% increase in CLABSI between 2020 and 2021 with the largest increase being in ICUs (10%).(CDC HAI webpage, accessed March 2023,
https://www.cdc.gov/hai/data/portal/progress-report.html)
Resources:
Bloodstream Infection Event (Central Line-Associated Bloodstream Infection and Non-central Line Associated Bloodstream Infection)
NHSN/CDC CLABSI definitions, criteria and surveillance.
CDC-Guidelines for the Prevention of Intravascular Catheter-related Infection (BSI)
These guidelines have been developed for healthcare personnel who insert intravascular catheters and for persons responsible for surveillance and control of infections in hospital, outpatient, and home healthcare settings. The guidelines provide a summary of recommendations to prevent Intravascular Catheter-Related Infections.
CDC-TAP Central Line-Associated Bloodstream Infections (CLABSI) Implementation Guide: Links to Example Resources
Examples and resources on implementing the CDC Targeted Assessment for Prevention (TAP) strategy to prevent CLABSI.