Research paperTime spent by infection control professionals undertaking healthcare associated infection surveillance: A multi-centred cross sectional study
Section snippets
Background
The Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, United States) define surveillance as the ongoing, systematic collection, analysis, and interpretation of health data essential to the planning, implementation and evaluation of public health practice, closely integrated with the timely dissemination of these data to those who need to know [1]. Surveillance is a critical component of any infection prevention and control program and is the foundation for providing a mechanism for an effective
Methods
A pseudonymous online web-based survey was used to conduct a cross-sectional study of infection control units in public and private Australian hospitals in 2014. Infection control co-ordinators of infection control units were invited to participate via combination of post (addressed to the infection control co-ordinator/manager) and email using an online moderated forum (AICA List). Participation was voluntary. Each invitation contained a unique identification code to identify any duplicate
Overview
Forty-nine hospital infection control units from across Australia completed the survey. Of the 49 responses received, details on the number of hours spent on a range of infection control activities was completed by 40 infection control units. These 40 infection control units were responsible for providing services to 138 hospitals (70% publicly funded hospitals) or 16,260 overnight beds. The mean age of respondents was 49 years, 95% were female. The total number of contracted infection control
Discussion
The results from this study provide insight into how much time Australian ICPs spend undertaking HAI surveillance. This is the first such study providing a national picture in Australia and one of a limited number internationally [5]. The findings suggest that Australian ICPs spend significantly less time undertaking HAI surveillance, compared to those working in the United States, 46.7% (95%CI 45.7–47.7) Vs 36.0% (95% CI 34.3%–37.8%) in our study [5].
We identified only 6.0% of ICP time is
Conclusion
In the international literature, there are limited data on how ICPs spend their time, with even less providing specific data on time taken to undertake HAI surveillance. HAI surveillance is a critical component of any infection control program. This study estimates that 36% of ICP time is spent undertaking HAI surveillance in Australian hospitals. There is ongoing debate in Australia about HAI surveillance and the next steps to take. Our findings will be useful for the planning of national and
Competing interests
Three of the authors (BM, AG and DM) have an editorial affiliation with Infection, Disease and Health. These authors play no role in the review or decision making process whatsoever.
BM and LH are members of the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality (ACSQHC) in Healthcare Technical Working Group. LH is a member of the ACSQHC healthcare associated infection advisory committee.
No financial support was provided for the conduct of this study. The Australian College of Infection Prevention and
Non-competing interests
The authors have no further non-competing interests to declare.
Author contributions
All authors provided input into the design of the study. BM was responsible for data collection and data analysis. LH assisted with data management. BM and AG lead the manuscript preparation. All authors read, provided critical review and approved the final manuscript.
Provenance and peer review
Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
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