August 26, 2012
Jorge Palacios
California
Department of Public Health (CDPH-CHCQ-HAI)
Re: Prevention of Hospital Associated Infections in our
Veteran’s Hospitals
Dear Mr. Palacious,
Once again, thank you
and the staff of the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) for the work
being done concerning patient safety.
My advocacy for the
prevention of Hospital Associated Infection (HAI) in our Veteran’s Hospitals
and my review of the revised CDPH web site has led me to a few basic questions.
Perhaps these questions should be directed to the Healthcare-Associated
Infection Advisory Committee (HAI-AC), please let me know for future inquires.
1.
There is no reference to either accepted,
planned or surveillance of “best practices” in the State of California
concerning HAI on your website, do you agree with this statement?
2.
Is the CDPH monitoring developments concerning
“best practices” concerning the prevention of HAI programs being funded by the
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in other states?
3.
Would the CDPH or the HAI-AC object to my
advocacy, “hai-five”, soliciting California elected officials concerning the
development of a “best practices database” for the prevention of HAI in the
State of California to be followed by
the solicitation of our United State’s Federal elected officials to locate
granting opportunities to establish and operate a pilot program.
4.
Could this database be offered “free of charge”
combined with an initial “voluntary” participation to all California Medical
Facilities, perhaps categorized System, Hospital, ACS?
Please understand my request does not ask for the “development” of the
“best practices”, they already exist, in my opinion, some in the Government
sector but most in the private sector but I would imagine the private sector
HAI programs would be, if accepted, purchased at fare market value.
Good or bad “practices” to start
would not matter, your current “surveillance” system would be an excellent
method to drive continuous improvements and drive the entire process to the
level of “evidence based medicine” our Veteran’s deserve in my opinion!
No response to this e-mail by
September 11, 2012 would be considered a “no-comment” and would give my advocacy
the direction to elevate my enquires to my State of California elected
officials.
Do bare in mind that our advocacy, “hai-five”, is dedicated to
“supporting those who help others”, including all of the staff at the CDPH and
hopefully the CDPH will consider our activities as an asset in the long term
goal of “preventing” HAI in our medical facilities!
Sincerely,
Michael H. Slavinski
"If we
can improve the quality of care, that will translate into lower cost,"
Anthem President Pam Kehaly said. "These are real dollars”
Ps The attached picture is another U.S. Peace Corps project,
a community incinerator. It is actually part of a “food security” project, not
what you might think! It starts with a “micro bank” for the farmers, next
teaching women groups how to process “shea” in the dry season to generate
income to procure food in the non-productive seasons and the incinerator, if
the pigs eat the plastic bags they “die”, you can understand the exemption of
the “carbon footprint”, it also takes out a lot of mosquito breeding containers.
How important is “food security”, they are farmers, not enough
land or anything else and the “rainy season” was three months late this year, “thank
you global warming”!
Sometimes I think my advocacy
for the prevention of HAI in our Veteran’s Hospitals is just a bit too much but
just watching what our kids are doing on the other side of the world makes my
efforts seem quite humble!
