Taking a Data-Driven Approach to Infection Prevention in Healthcare

Managing infection prevention (IP) can be overwhelming and creating a plan might seem daunting. That being said, infection prevention in healthcare can be made easy again with the help of a comprehensive, data-driven plan. One part of developing this type of plan is leveraging technology and data.  By using predictive systems to target high-risk areas and automate reporting, your organization can avoid costs and non-compliance deficiencies, as well as ensure quality infection prevention with greater ease. 

A data-driven approach transforms infection prevention from a reactive to a proactive discipline. It enables healthcare facilities to anticipate outbreaks, optimize resources, and improve patient outcomes through measurable and repeatable strategies. It also creates a way for infection preventionists to communicate to other leaders about the impact of their individual departments on infection prevention which facilitates collaboration and relationship building which is key to a successful program.

In this article, I’ll show you how to create a data-driven infection prevention plan for your organization, and provide implementation strategies to help your organization get back on track with infection prevention quickly.

What is a Data-Driven Approach, and Why is it Important?

A data-driven approach to infection prevention simply refers to an infection prevention process that prioritizes quantitative data and analytical tools to identify, monitor, and reduce the risk of infections. This approach enhances decision-making by replacing anecdotal or purely reactive strategies with proactive, evidence-based practices. There’s no better way to get an accurate picture of your organization’s risk and how to best mitigate it than with the raw data itself. Further, this helps communicate to other people across your organization the need for comprehensive infection prevention measures, making implementation a priority for everyone. 

Data can also help you clarify the “why,” and connect the dots for frontline staff. It’s important to let them know why certain behaviors are important and connect it back to patient care, since their priority is to take care of people. It also allows frontline staff to recognize the direct impact of their behaviors on the patient or resident.  No healthcare worker plans to harm a patient, but we see it happen all the time through infection prevention breaches such as inadequate hand hygiene and cross contamination.  Tying the infection prevention program together with patient care demonstrates how everyone is working together to protect patients. Making decisions based on facility-specific data informs the best patient care because it reinforces accountability and personal responsibility. 

Turning Data Into Prevention

The first step to creating an infection prevention plan for your organization is determining your “Must-Dos.” These are your state regulations, federal regulations, and any certifications or accreditations that your organization is required to maintain. The next step is to review the current state of your organization’s infection prevention program. Once you’ve determined your Must-Dos and reviewed your organization’s current infection prevention program, you can more easily identify any gaps that may exist between the two, and make a plan to address the gaps. 

From here, the next step is to formulate an infection prevention plan that leverages data collection and analysis to better inform your organization’s strategies for infection prevention — for that you’ll need both technology and collaboration. 

Software and Reporting Mechanisms

This is really where the rubber meets the road in data-driven infection prevention. With automated reporting and monitoring technologies, you can gather useful data regarding HAIs, potential outbreaks, and even update your organization’s infection prevention risk assessment and plan in real time in accordance with the data. Software also allows you to gather data that will be relevant when trying to encourage collaboration across departments to make the infection prevention plan a natural part of everyone’s daily practices and routines. 

Collaboration Across Departments

As stated previously, collaboration across departments is key to effective infection prevention in a healthcare facility. Everyone needs to support and understand their role in the infection plan for the organization. One way to achieve support is by using the data to reinforce the needed response. In my experience, people don’t often respond to anecdotal information as well as they do to the facts, i.e. numbers.  With the data you’ve gathered from your technologies and software systems, you are better equipped to tell your facility’s infection prevention story and get people to buy into your program. 

Steps To Data-Driven Infection Prevention

The key to creating an effective infection prevention program is following a structured approach. I recommend following these steps in order because each one informs the next. 

Annual Evaluations

An annual evaluation involves looking at all relevant infection prevention data collected in the prior 12 months. Whether it’s HAIs, hand hygiene, PPE compliance, or whatever else you’re monitoring, it’s important to begin by gathering all your organization’s relevant data. Also, you can look at the goals you set for the prior year, and determine whether or not you met those goals. Once you collect all of these data points in your annual evaluation, you have a clearer picture of how your organization performed in the prior year. 

Risk Assessment

With the information from your annual evaluation, you can now perform a risk assessment to determine where your organization needs to improve its infection prevention plan for the next year. A risk assessment is a quantitative tool that assigns a score to different categories and events related to infection prevention. For those who prefer a structured format, a customizable risk assessment is available here. Categories may include probability of risk, severity of the risk, and preparedness for a risk event. 

Once you go through scoring in the various categories, you can calculate a final score, which allows you to prioritize all the different events and categories. This can be very helpful when bringing the risk assessment to your infection prevention committee. With a categorized report of risks informed by data from your annual evaluation, everyone can quickly see your priorities and the data that support your decision. This is also how you show that your program is relevant to your facility — often an important metric for inspectors. 

Plan and Goals

Use the information in your risk assessment to develop your annual infection prevention plan. In the plan, you’re combining the priorities you identified in the risk assessment, as well as any gaps you identified during the analysis you previously conducted of your must-dos, and your healthcare facility’s current infection prevention program. With your new plan, you can now set goals for the coming year. It’s not unusual for the same organization to have different goals every year. Keep in mind that your patient population might shift, your staff turns over, and there are regulatory changes that may require adjustments. 

By repeating this entire process annually, you’ll be able to show how effective your plan has been at mitigating risk and achieving the goals you set using data you’ll collect during your annual evaluation.

For those who prefer a structured format, a customizable plan and annual goals are available here.

How To Meet Your Infection Prevention Goals

Make It Easy to Comply

The key to achieving high-levels of compliance with your infection prevention program is by integrating simple solutions that are easy to implement and maintain. Most of the time when we see non-compliance, it’s because a process is broken or because there is something in the way of a healthcare worker’s compliance. To achieve your goals, make sure that infection prevention is easy for your frontline staff. Accessible surveillance or reporting mechanisms for HAI and communicable diseases such as anonymous incident reports or comment cards are straightforward, easy-to-use solutions that make infection prevention compliance easy for your staff to integrate into their daily practices. 

Use Technology and Innovation

There are lots of electronic surveillance tools available now for real-time data analysis, making quicker intervention possible. There are also new technologies that can provide an added layer of protection to regular cleaning and disinfection protocols, further mitigating the risks of an infection outbreak. Automated screening tools for staff and visitors provide another layer of added protection against an infection outbreak, allowing you to identify and prevent an outbreak before it occurs. Lastly, process automation takes the guesswork out of routine tasks such as cleaning and disinfection and ensures everybody knows the proper order of tasks to ensure the process is done correctly. 

Adjust Policies and Procedures Accordingly

With your new goals, it may be necessary to adjust some policies and procedures for your facility to ensure compliance. Use your new, adjusted procedures to guide staff behavior.  Record trainings on the improved procedures and upload them to your learning management system so staff can watch and better understand new processes or policies. Further, it’s important to ensure acknowledgement of receipt of these new policies and procedures from your staff. This helps to avoid paperwork-related deficiencies and potential delays at your facility due to non-compliance. 

Strategically Use Education and Training 

Another critical step in implementing your infection prevention program effectively is empowering your frontline staff with education and accountability. We need to build the culture of infection prevention by making sure people are educated on the program and expectations, rewarding compliance, and holding people accountable when we see repeated behaviors.  

Engage Leaders and Physicians

Building a culture of infection prevention is an important step in ensuring success of any infection prevention plan. Firstly, engaging leaders and physicians is crucial. By starting at the top, and using the data you’ve collected to prove to them what infection prevention risks exist at your facility and why your program will help address these risks, you get people to buy into your program at the highest levels of the organization. Physicians and leaders who become believers in your program will then become your champions, encouraging infection prevention compliance on your behalf. 

Furthermore, it’s important to deploy champions in every department, to make sure the message spreads to everyone on your staff. You can’t be everywhere at once—you need some extenders to help you.

Environmental Rounds

You can’t do infection prevention from your office. Regular environmental rounds ensuring compliance across your facility is key to making sure your infection prevention plan is actually working in practice, not just on paper. These environmental rounds will also help your facility stay prepared for an accreditation survey at all time—no more asking yourself, Are You Accreditation Survey Ready or Just Compliant? 

For those who prefer a structured format, a customizable EOC rounding tool is available here.

Reap the Benefits of a Data-Driven Approach

A data-driven approach to infection prevention is the surest way to create a program that correctly identifies and addresses any infection prevention-related risks that may exist in your organization, prove to others at all levels of your organization why your program is necessary and practical for your facility by having the numbers to back up your conclusions, and be most effective at reducing incidence of HAIs and protecting patients. 

As we’ve learned, the most effective infection prevention program is one that’s easy to implement, easy for your staff to follow, and easy to update as priorities and regulations evolve. I’ve helped many organizations improve their programs and I’d love to help you! 

An all-in-one platform that combines compliance with a learning management system, like MedTrainer, puts critical infection prevention activities in one platform to eliminate multiple logins and disparate user experiences. Incident reporting, policy management, and compliance training in one place make infection prevention easy for every employee, which will help your organization eliminate risk and provide the best patient care.