Hospital-acquired infections are a significant concern for healthcare systems worldwide. These infections, which are not present upon a patient’s initial hospital admission, can include wound-related infections post-surgery, urinary tract infections and pneumonia. Such infections not only inflict further discomfort and complications for the patient, but also exert considerable cost pressure on our already strained health systems, due to extended hospital stays and additional treatments. Alarmingly, hospital-acquired infections cause an estimated 7,500 deaths per annum in Australia. It’s thus crucial to prevent these infections for the wellbeing of patients, maintaining system efficiencies, and minimizing antibiotic use.
In our research, evidence suggests that medical equipment, including items like blood pressure machines, dressing trolleys and drip stands could comprise a major source of infection due to frequent shared use. However, our recent breakthrough demonstrates that consistent disinfection of this shared medical equipment can significantly minimize hospital-induced infections, thereby saving our health system a significant amount of money.
In a practical experiment conducted within a New South Wales hospital, we introduced a raft of stringent cleaning measures on several wards, with a specific focus on frequently utilized medical equipment. The cleaning protocol was instituted by expertly trained cleaners, this being an adjustment to the norm, as the usual practice was for the clinical staff to shoulder this responsibility. On introducing the cleaning measures, we observed that adherence to cleaning procedures improved dramatically, from a mere 24% to an emphatic 66%. This directly translated to hospital-acquired infections plummeting by approximately a third, a remnant from 14.9% to 9.8% of patients. Extrapolating these statistics, for every 1,000 patients treated on wards with the new cleaning measures, we projected 30 fewer infections compared to the old protocol.
Understanding the exorbitant costs associated with treating hospital-induced infections – roughly AUD$2.1 million for 1,000 patients, as per our estimates – our analysis revealed a significant cost drop to AUD$1.5 million per 1,000 patients with the new cleaning protocol, even considering cleaner wages and cleaning supplies expenses. Taking these factors into the equation, the implementation of our cleaning measures could result in a hospital saving of roughly AUD$642,000 for every 1,000 patients treated.
Our study acknowledges its limitations, such as the fact that it was conducted in a single Australian hospital, and there may be variations in cleaning practices in other hospitals. However, the essence of our findings remains; prioritising effective cleaning of medical equipment appears to be a sensible strategy- both for the health of patients and health system finances. Thorough cleaning and disinfection can significantly reduce the risk of infections, and improved cleaning in hospitals is undeniably cost-effective. For healthcare administrators, it should be a key consideration. Hence, better cleaning practices should be considered as pivotal investments within hospital settings.