Healthcare-Associated Infections-Nursing Paper Examples

Healthcare-Associated Infections

Healthcare-associated infections-1 (HAIs) are an immense burden for US healthcare systems, public authorities, and patients. The potentially avoidable infections increase morbidity, mortality, and healthcare costs. While HAIs were initially linked to admissions to acute care settings, the infections now entail infections obtained in long-term care facilities, home care, family clinics, and ambulatory care. The nosocomial-acquired infections may be incubating or not present during hospital admission.

Thus, infections first appear 48 hours or more after hospitalization or 30 days within care delivery (Ponsford et al., 2021). Specifically, HAIs have a high incidence rate, affecting one in every 31 hospital admissions. About 2 million patients develop HAIs annually, with 90000 estimated deaths making HAIs the fifth cause of death in acute care hospitals. (Sahiledengle et al., 2020). Thus, a quality initiative will be instrumental in devising organizational change to curb HAIs in hospital settings (Healthcare-Associated Infections).

Problem Description

Healthcare-associated infections-1 are linked with adverse health outcomes. The infections include central-line associated bloodstream infections, catheter-associated infections, ventilator-acquired pneumonia, clostridium difficile infections, and surgical site infections. The risks of infections depend on the infection control of healthcare facilities, patients’ immune status, and the prevalence of pathogens within the environment.

Thus, the risk factors for HAIs include immunosuppression, lengthy hospital stays, old age, underlying comorbidities, frequent patient visits, recent invasive procedures, mechanical ventilator support, prolonged stay in the ICU, and indwelling devices (Blot et al., 2022). Infected patients present with shortness of breath, fever, productive cough, abdominal pain, palpitations, dysuria, polyuria, suprapubic pain, and altered mental health status. Nonetheless, collaboration among healthcare providers will aid in addressing patients’ symptoms and improving their condition (Healthcare-Associated Infections).

The Setting

This project will focus on HAIs in a long-term care setting. Although HAIs can now be acquired in acute care facilities, home care, family clinics, and ambulatory care, hospitals, and long-term care settings are majorly affected by the problem. The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention asserts that about 1.7 million hospitalized patients acquire HAIs annually during care for other healthcare issues, and more than 98000 patients (one in 17) die from the infection (Alharbi et al., 2020).

Second, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality claims HAIs are the most common adverse event or complication in US hospital care. In long-term care settings, critically ill patients are highly susceptible to HAIs due to their immuno-compromised status and long stay (Healthcare-Associated Infections).

Effects of the Problem

Healthcare-associated infections-1 harm the quality of care and patient safety. As mentioned, the problem increases patient morbidity and mortality rates (Peters et al., 2019). Patients acquire infections that would otherwise be avoidable while receiving health care services. These infections may lead to direct deaths or complications that cause more patient deaths.

Besides the negative health impacts, HAIs infections pose immense health costs for patients, healthcare facilities, health systems, and the government, disease burden, and healthcare resources wastage (Wang et al., 2022). Patients’ prolonged hospitalizations are the significant causes of increased health expenses. Healthcare-associated infections-1 also lead to high healthcare expenses making quality healthcare services unaffordable for patients. Inadequate quality care leads to high disease prevalence and ill-health communities.

Proposed Solution

Quality improvement initiative is vital to devise change towards evidence-based practice in curbing healthcare-associated infections-1 in acute care settings. Healthcare professionals should implement evidence-based interventions to achieve the desired outcome. In this case, evidence-based care bundles are the proposed interventions for HAI problems. The care bundles comprise primary prevention, detection, tertiary prevention/case management, and implementation elements (García et al., 2022).

Primary prevention may entail improving hygiene, limiting the use of indwelling devices, or using alternatives to prevent the risks of HAIs. Second, detection entails secondary prevention through enhanced surveillance and screening programs for early identification and management of HAIs. Third, tertiary prevention entails managing advanced HAIs through antibiotics and collaborating with healthcare professionals (García et al., 2022). Lastly, the implementation element comprises education initiatives, changing physical structure and equipment such as hand hygiene infrastructure, and adequate availability of antibiotics to curb HAIs.

Significance of the Topic and its Implications for Nursing Practice

Reduced prevalence and incidence of HAIs is a priority for health professionals, health organizations, and systems globally. The topic will be crucial for improving nurses’ and other health professionals’ knowledge, skills, and competency in curbing HAIs. Competency-based training through seminars, conferences, and evidence-based change projects will ensure that nurses and other healthcare professionals learn about the current and best practices to curb HAIs (Munro et al., 2021).

Moreover, studying the topic will provide insights into evidence-based practices. Using evidence-based interventions obtained from the topic’s literature will aid in preventing and reducing HAIs in acute care settings. As a result, reduced HAIs and their complications, prolonged hospitalizations, and healthcare cost outcomes will lead to improved quality care and patient safety

References

Alharbi, R. D., Ali, A. H. M., Almatroudi, A., & Mohamed, S. (2020). The potential sources of transmission of hospital-acquired infection by routine devices in the adult ICU in Alrass General Hospital. Journal of Biosciences and Medicines, 8(4), 69-80.

Blot, S., Ruppé, E., Harbarth, S., Asehnoune, K., Poulakou, G., Luyt, C. E., … & Zahar, J. R. (2022). Healthcare-associated infections in adult intensive care unit patients: Changes in epidemiology, diagnosis, prevention and contributions of new technologies. Intensive and Critical Care Nursing, 70, 103227.

García, A. M., Cross, J. H., Fitchett, E. J., Kawaza, K., Okomo, U., Spotswood, N. E., … & Lawn, J. E. (2022). Infection prevention and care bundles addressing healthcare-associated infections in neonatal care in low-middle income countries: a scoping review. EClinicalMedicine, 44, 101259.

Munro, S. C., Baker, D., Giuliano, K. K., Sullivan, S. C., Haber, J., Jones, B. E., … & Klompas, M. (2021). Nonventilator hospital-acquired pneumonia: A call to action: Recommendations from the National Organization to Prevent Hospital-Acquired Pneumonia (NOHAP) among nonventilated patients. Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology, 42(8), 991-996.

Peters, L., Olson, L., Khu, D. T., Linnros, S., Le, N. K., Hanberger, H., … & Larsson, M. (2019). Multiple antibiotic resistance as a risk factor for mortality and prolonged hospital stay: a cohort study among neonatal intensive care patients with hospital-acquired infections caused by gram-negative bacteria in Vietnam. PloS one, 14(5), e0215666.

Ponsford, M. J., Jefferies, R., Davies, C., Farewell, D., Humphreys, I. R., Jolles, S., … & Barry, S. (2021). The burden of nosocomial 1: results from the Wales multi-center retrospective observational study of 2518 hospitalized adults. medRxiv, 2021-01.

Sahiledengle, B., Seyoum, F., Abebe, D., Geleta, E. N., Negash, G., Kalu, A., … & Quisido, B. J. E. (2020). Incidence and risk factors for hospital-acquired infection among pediatric patients in a teaching hospital: a prospective study in southeast Ethiopia. BMJ open, 10(12), e037997.

Wang, Y., Yang, J., Qiao, F., Feng, B., Hu, F., Xi, Z. A., … & Yuan, Y. (2022). Compared hand hygiene compliance among healthcare providers before and after the COVID-19 pandemic: A rapid review and meta-analysis. American Journal of Infection Control, 50(5), 563-571.