Hospital infection law takes effect

From viruses to bacteria, there are hundreds of different kinds of infections you can get at a hospital.

It is a big national problem and one that is consuming a tremendous amount of health care resources and doctors,” says Dr. Norm Lindenmuth, vice president and chief medical officer of quality at Excellus BCBS in Rochester.  

The most recent data from Excellus shows in 2004, more than 4000 people in the Finger Lakes region contracted an infection at area hospitals; 221 people died from those infections. Beginning this year, a new state law requires hospitals across New York State to track hospital-acquired infections in a timely and consistent manner.

“It's an overwhelming job, you wouldn't think it would be that difficult, but the number of cultures going to the laboratory every day coming from different regions of the hospital, coming from different time frames it gets very, very difficult to identify and track patterns,” says Lindenmuth.

“What it has changed is the fact that there are certainly are deadlines, timing, electronic entry into systems,” says  Linda Greene, RN who heads the infection control unit at Rochester General Hospital, “you not only look at the patients who get infected but you also look at denominator data on all people who had that particular procedure.”

Many area hospitals like Rochester General Hospital, Strong Memorial Hospital, Unity Hospital are implementing new software to help ease the workload and perfect the data. The overall goal is to identify potentially dangerous infection trends across the state before they become epidemic problems.

“We've been able to use technology to help us work smarter,” says Greene.