SCR132

THE SENATE	S.C.R. NO.	132
TWENTY-THIRD LEGISLATURE, 2005
STATE OF HAWAII

SENATE CONCURRENT

RESOLUTION

requesting the healthcare association of hawaii to establish a task force to design a system for reporting hospital acquired infections to the public.

WHEREAS, although hospitals in Hawaii and the rest of the nation have had infection surveillance, prevention, and control programs for over thirty years, a national trend has begun to mandate the reporting of hospital-acquired infection data to the public; and

WHEREAS, although Florida, Illinois, Missouri, and Pennsylvania have now enacted mandatory reporting of hospital-acquired infection data, each of the four states has different requirements and there is currently no national standardized method for collecting and comparing hospital infection rates; and

WHEREAS, many hospitals use the National Nosocomial Infections Surveillance System definitions to identify and measure the occurrence of health care-associated infections, but, because each hospital monitors those infections and procedures that are most risky for their specific patient population, not all hospitals monitor the same infections, making it difficult to compare infection rates among different hospitals; and

WHEREAS, in order to use infection surveillance data to compare the quality of care between hospitals, all hospitals would have to collect the same data on the same types of infections and use the same methods to identify infections; and

WHEREAS, another complicating factor is that some hospitals admit patients who are more prone to infections than other hospitals, and in addition, certain types of treatments and procedures performed by a hospital have a greater chance for infection, which means that an adjustment factor must be developed so that hospital-specific information meaningfully compares the infection rates of different hospitals; and

WHEREAS, the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology has identified issues that must be considered in reporting hospital-acquired infection rates, as follows:

(1) Selection of appropriate indicators that will reflect the quality of care and are potentially preventable;

(2) Standardized definitions and collection methods of infection or other reportable events;

(3) Selection of appropriate patients to monitor and use appropriate denominators in establishing rates;

(4) Risk adjustment methods to account for differences in patient populations served, such as age and severity of illness, and therefore the likelihood of infections in those patients;

(5) Ensuring that facilities dedicate appropriate resources to surveillance and reporting without compromising infection prevention and control activities;

(6) Ensuring that adequate resources are available for the design, collection, analysis, reporting, and validation of the system, with appropriate follow-up for significant findings at the state level;

(7) Establishing an advisory group consisting of infection control professionals, epidemiologists, public health professionals, health care facility representatives, and consumers to participate in the design, implementation, validation, and evaluation of the reporting system; and

(8) Use of a phased-in approach to evaluate the selected indicators and ensure they are meaningful; and

WHEREAS, the members of the Healthcare Association of Hawaii include all of the hospitals in the State; now, therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED by the Senate of the Twenty-third Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2005, the House of Representatives concurring, that the Healthcare Association of Hawaii is requested to establish a task force to design a system for reporting hospital-acquired infections to the public; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the task force is requested to include representation of the interests of infection control professionals, epidemiologists, public health professionals, health care facility representatives, and consumers and that the task force is requested to consider the foregoing issues identified by the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the task force is requested to submit a progress report to the Legislature no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the Regular Session of 2006, including any necessary proposed draft legislation and resource needs, if available at that time; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the task force is requested to submit a final report to the Legislature no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the Regular Session of 2007, including any necessary proposed draft legislation; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the Governor, the Director of Health, the President of the Healthcare Association of Hawaii, and the President of the Hawaii Chapter of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology.

	OFFERED BY:	_____________________________

Report Title:

Hospital-Acquired Infection; Design of Reporting System