Hospitals disclose patient safety data
April 30, 2009
Megan Ogilvie
HEALTH REPORTER
Hospitals across the province today publicly disclosed key hospital quality and safety data, including rates of deadly hospital acquired infections.
The move is part of a province-wide push to improve patient safety. Experts say reporting patient safety indicators to the public will spur hospitals to do more to prevent and manage infections. The province also launched a website that will allow members of the public to search the safety ratings of individual hospitals.
Ontario reported its first patient safety indicator — rates of C. difficile, a bacterium that causes potentially deadly diarrhea — last September. Rates for two other hospital-acquired infections — methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) — were first reported last December.
The Ministry of Health released rates for four additional patient safety indicators today at 1:00 p.m.
* Hand hygiene compliance among health care providers in hospitals. The province found 62 per cent of health care workers perform hand hygiene at specific times during patient care, including before and after patient contact.
* The number of central line infection cases that develop in intensive care units.
* The number of ventilator-associated pneumonia cases that develop in intensive care units.
* A specific surgical site infection prevention measure. The province found 85 per cent of patients getting a hip or knee replacement surgery received antibiotics within the appropriate time period before surgery.
"This program is designed to identify how safe our hospitals are, and to make them safer," said Dr. Michael Baker, the province's executive lead for patient safety.
The patient-friendly website allows the public to search rates of local hospitals.
Go to ontario.ca/patientsafety to search for patient safety indicators at your local hospital. Stay with healthzone.ca for more on this story.
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