UAB Medical West Hospital is one of 27 hospitals participating in the Putting Power into Healthcare Initiative, which will improve health quality compliance, reduce healthcare-associated infections, improve patient outcomes and help drive down health costs through innovative use of technology. The initiative launched this month, is a shared vision between Proventix Systems, Inc., a Birmingham-based technology company and Alabama Power.
The Putting Power into Healthcare Initiative (PPHI) recently installed the Proventix’s nGage system at UAB Medical West Hospital, which uses active communication units and radio-frequency badges tied to a data and quality compliance monitoring system. By using nGage, hospitals can measure when and how often their employees and healthcare professionals wash their hands. Participating hospitals have installed the system in patient rooms and other areas where patient care is provided.
Hand hygiene is widely accepted as the most effective means of reducing healthcare-associated infections (HAIs). Despite efforts by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the World Health Organization (WHO) and The Joint Commission (TJC) to promote effective hand hygiene as the single most important way to reduce infection risk, high levels of sustained hand hygiene compliance by healthcare workers remain elusive.
PPHI is the first-ever statewide effort to use a sophisticated, data-backed network that encourages and measures hand-washing across multiple hospitals in a single state. “PPHI is also part of a bigger vision that goes beyond hand hygiene,” said Harvey Nix, CEO of Proventix. “We have an opportunity to improve the delivery of care through collaboration among healthcare workers, active point-of-care communications and standardized processes. This effort is focused not only on infection prevention, but also on quality care.”
Until now, the key barrier to improving hand hygiene practices and compliance rates has been the inability to track and measure compliance across a hospital. Healthcare and government officials have noticed the flaws of previously utilized methods and have called for research and development of new sciences to improve to more prompt, accurate and efficient measurement of hand hygiene compliance.
“By using nGage, our hospital will be able to measure when and how often our employees and healthcare professionals wash their hands,” said Tom McDougal, CEO of UAB Medical West Hospital. “Unwashed hands are a leading source of transmitted infection.”
Currently, Proventix has the nation’s largest database of hand hygiene events, having measured over 5 million episodes. Using the data and measurable outcomes the system is proven, working and very promising for scaling at the national level.
To learn more about PPHI, please visit http://www.proventix.com/pphi or call (205) 383-1156.
Proventix Systems, Inc., based in Birmingham, Alabama, is a technology company whose mission is to eliminate the human and economic costs of infectious disease in healthcare. They provide tools and services for quality compliance monitoring, active point of care communication, and successful behavior modification. Visit: www.proventix.com