Photo courtesy of the California Department of Public Health.

Infection Prevention
Healthcare-Associated Infections (HAI) for Healthcare Providers

Preventing and reducing healthcare-associated infections (HAI) is a top priority for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The HHS Steering Committee for HAI was established in July 2008, to develop the HHS Action Plan to Prevent Healthcare-Associated Infections, which provides a roadmap for HAI prevention in acute care hospitals. The HHS Action Plan includes recommendations for surveillance, research, communication and metrics for measuring progress towards national goals.

The second State HAI Plan to respond and prevent healthcare-associated infections (HAI) was published in 2017. The HAI Program and other stakeholders use the plan to identify current progress, guide future initiatives, and identify areas for improvement. The plan can be used as a resource for healthcare facilities and consumers to understand current and planned future HAI prevention and response activities.

The HAI Plan focuses on three primary calls to action:

*RESPOND to threats of infectious disease transmission
*ANALYZE data to target prevention activities
*PREVENT future HAIs, infection control breaches, high threat infectious diseases (e.g. Ebola) and antimicrobial resistance

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC) have published numerous infection prevention guidelines for use in healthcare facilities. The HICPAC is a federal advisory committee made up of 14 external infection control and public health experts who provide guidance to the CDC regarding the practice of healthcare infection prevention and control, strategies for surveillance, and prevention and control of HAI in United States healthcare facilities. 

Guidelines & Guidance Library https://www.cdc.gov/infectioncontrol/guidelines/index.html
https://www.dhhs.nh.gov/dphs/cdcs/hai/publications.htm

Source: cdc.gov

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