Texas Hospitals Realize Gains From Quality And Patient Safety Investments

(AUSTIN, Texas – March 26, 2019) Continuing several years of progress, Texas hospitals again reported improvements in health care quality and patient safety, according to new data on health care acquired infections from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“Texas hospitals have yet again shown that quality and patient safety are job one,” said Robert Hendler, M.D., chief medical officer, Texas Hospital Association. “Despite being asked to do more with less, Texas hospitals continue investing in improving quality and reducing harm. Texas patients deserve the best care, and Texas hospitals are able to deliver on that promise.”

The CDC data show that Texas hospitals reduced the number of health care acquired infections between 2016 and 2017 for all seven infections reported to the federal government:

• Central Line-Associated Blood Stream Infection (CLABSI): decrease of 13 percent.
• Catheter Associated Urinary Tract Infection (CAUTI): decrease of 13 percent.
• Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA): decrease of 24 percent.
• Clostridioides difficile (C. difficile): decrease of 25 percent.
• Surgical Site Infections – abdominal hysterectomy: decrease of 21 percent.
• Surgical Site Infections – colon surgery: decrease of 14 percent.
• Ventilator-Associated Events (VAE): decrease of 25 percent.

Texas hospitals’ reductions outperformed the national average for six of these seven infections.

The data are reported to the National Healthcare Safety Network by Texas acute care hospitals.

More information on the CDC report can be found online at https://www.cdc.gov/hai/data/portal/progress-report.html

In addition to working with 104 hospitals through the Hospital Improvement and Innovation Network on reducing health care-acquired infections, THA works with more than 300 hospitals on multiple other quality and patient safety-related initiatives, including the Texas AIM initiative with 207 hospitals, Patient Safety Organization with 90 participating hospitals and the Critical Access Hospital Quality Improvement Group with 83 participating hospitals.

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About THA
Founded in 1930, the Texas Hospital Association is the leadership organization and principal advocate for the state’s hospitals and health care systems. Based in Austin, THA enhances its members’ abilities to improve accessibility, quality and cost-effectiveness of health care for all Texans. One of the largest hospital associations in the country, THA represents 452 of the state’s non-federal general and specialty hospitals and health care systems, which employ some 400,000 health care professionals statewide. Learn more about THA at www.tha.org or follow THA on Twitter at http://twitter.com/texashospitals.