Getting the Message Out: Use of Business Intelligence to Disseminate Infection Control Metrics

Background: Infection control (IC) is the keeper of data that serve as metrics for infection prevention improvement projects. Business intelligence (BI) is an umbrella term that refers to systems for acquiring, warehousing, analyzing, and managing data for presentation. Key metrics are delivered to the organization via interactive and static dashboard reports, amplifying their visibility and enabling users to act on the results. We describe our use of BI to disseminate key infection control metrics to hospital leadership and bedside caregivers.

Objective: To describe the use of BI to organize and report data for 3 different IC initiatives: hand hygiene (HH), Staphylococcus aureus (SA) surveillance, and a “Days Since” infection dashboard for intensive care units (ICU).

Methods: Infection Control partnered with Medical Operations to automate the process for reporting results of surveillance activities for key projects. HH:  Beginning in 2007 HH observations were recorded in a custom web form, warehoused, and reported immediately on the HH dashboard.

SA:  In 2009 a SA screening and eradication project was initiated across all ICU. Data from disparate data sources including admissions, pharmacy, and lab information systems was automated and combined in the warehouse with data recorded in an infection control database (AICE version 5, ICPA Inc.). Constructed reports track adherence to the process and report SA colonization transmission and infection data.

Days Since: To support multiple ICU infection prevention projects, the Days Since Infection Dashboard was created. Episodes of ICU central line associated bloodstream infection, ventilator associated pneumonia, and Clostridium difficile associated diarrhea are entered into a custom web form, warehoused, and reported immediately as the number of days between events.

Results: HH dashboard provided interactive display of observations, over 51,000 in past 12 months (Figure 1).  Observations encompassed 18 clinical institutes and 91 treatment areas.   6 Crystal™ reports were constructed to track, to date, SA surveillance for 12,940 patients treated by 7 different ICU service lines.  “Days Since” Dashboard functioned to support 2 ICU initiatives – VAP bundle and CLABSI bundle.  Trending data is available at both aggregate and individual ICU level. 

Conclusions: Using BI is an effective means of providing timely data to support infection prevention initiatives.  This methodology provides a data infrastructure for future projects across our healthcare enterprise.