Infection rates at California hospitals released

The California Department of Public Health has released its second annual report on hospital-acquired infections at hospitals statewide, in what officials say is an effort to cut infection rates and provide consumers with more information about health care providers.

?These reports provide the most detailed picture yet of healthcare-associated infections in California hospitals,? department Director Dr. Ron Chapman said in a news release. ?Changes that are made to improve quality of care as a result of these data will potentially save hundreds of lives in California each year.?

A law passed by the Legislature in 2008 requires hospitals to report the data and for the state to make it available online beginning in 2010.

Hospitals throughout San Diego County reported their data, contributing to a 91 percent to 98 percent rate of compliance statewide.

The reports looked at rates for hospital-acquired MRSA, or Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, a virulent staph infection resistant to most antibiotics; VRE, a type of bloodstream infection called vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus; central line-associated bloodstream infections; and surgical site infections.

Some infection rates were expected to be higher in teaching and long-term acute care hospitals where more severely ill patients are treated, state officials said. For that reason, some reports broke out separate data for major teaching hospitals, long-term acute care hospitals, pediatric hospitals and general community hospitals.

Among hospitals in San Diego, the reports showed:

? San Diego County hospitals with rates of MRSA worse than the state average were: Alvarado Hospital, Kaiser Foundation Hospital of San Diego, Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center, Sharp Grossmont Hospital and Tri-City Medical Center. Among long-term acute care hospitals, Vibra Hospital of San Diego scored worse than the state average.

? San Diego hospitals with rates of VRE worse than the state average were: Alvarado Hospital, Kaiser Foundation Hospital of San Diego, Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center, Sharp Grossmont Hospital, and Tri-City Medical Center.

? For central line-associated bloodstream infections, the state divided the data into 37 categories for different patient care areas within the hospitals. San Diego hospitals did relatively well overall, with most scoring at or better than state averages in all patient areas.

Hospitals scoring worse than the state average in one of the 37 categories were: Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla, in surgical critical care; Scripps Mercy Hospital, in its general medical ward; Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center, in its general medical ward; UCSD Medical Center, in its medical/surgical critical care, compared only with major teaching hospitals; Promise Hospital of San Diego and Vibra Hospital, compared with long-term acute care facilities.

? The state also looked at surgical site infections at hospitals where the data was available for colon surgeries, coronary bypass surgeries, and hip or knee replacement surgeries. San Diego hospitals reporting sufficient data for analysis had rates within the expected range for the hospital?s patient population.

? The state also reviewed infection rates of a bacterium associated with serious intestinal conditions. Patients taking antibiotics for prolonged periods are susceptible to the bacterium, Clostridium difficile, and can be exposed to it through unclean hands or contaminated surfaces. The report cautions against comparing hospitals because testing procedures weren?t uniform and the study did not adjust for different risk factors among patient populations at different hospitals.

Source: http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2012/jan/06/infection-rates-california-hospitals-released/

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