Effect of proactive infection control measures on benchmarked rate of hospital outbreaks: An analysis of public hospitals in Hong Kong over 5 years

Background Hospital outbreaks of epidemiologically important pathogens are usually caused by lapses in infection control measures and result in increased morbidity, mortality, and cost. However, there is no benchmark to compare the occurrence of hospital outbreaks across hospitals. Methods We implem...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:American journal of infection control 2015-09, Vol.43 (9), p.965-970
Main Authors: Cheng, Vincent C.C., MD, Tai, Josepha W.M., PhD, Wong, Lisa M.W., MSc (IC), Ching, Radley H.C., BSN, Ng, Modissa M.L., MSN, Ho, Sara K.Y., BN, Lee, Doris W.Y., BSN, Li, W.S., BSN, Lee, W.M., MSN, Sridhar, Siddharth, MRCP, Wong, Sally C.Y., FRCPath, Ho, P.L., MD, Yuen, K.Y., MD
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Benchmarking
Benchmarks
Directly observed
Disease Outbreaks - statistics & numerical data
Effects
Environmental hygiene
Epidemics
Epidemiological Monitoring
Epidemiology
Hand Hygiene
Hong Kong - epidemiology
Hospitals, Public
Humans
Infection Control
Infection Control - methods
Infection Control - organization & administration
Infectious Disease
Intervention
Nosocomial infections
Staff education
Surveillance
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Summary:Background Hospital outbreaks of epidemiologically important pathogens are usually caused by lapses in infection control measures and result in increased morbidity, mortality, and cost. However, there is no benchmark to compare the occurrence of hospital outbreaks across hospitals. Methods We implemented proactive infection control measures with an emphasis on timely education of health care workers and hospitalized patients at Queen Mary Hospital, a teaching hospital. Our benchmarked performance (outbreak episodes per 1 million patient discharges and 1 million patient-days) was compared with those of other regional public hospitals without these additional proactive measures in place between 2010 and 2014. Results During the study period, Queen Mary Hospital had 1 hospital outbreak resulting in 1.48 and 0.45 outbreak episodes per 1 million patient discharges and patient-days, respectively, values significantly lower than the corresponding overall rates in the 7 acute regional hospitals (24.26 and 6.70 outbreak episodes per 1 million patient discharges and patient-days, respectively; P  
ISSN:0196-6553
1527-3296
DOI:10.1016/j.ajic.2015.04.203