Database of Best Practices for the Prevention of Healthcare Associated Infections, "road trip"!

Vicky Janssen                                             January 23, 2013

District Director

Honorable California Assemblyman Achadjian

35th Assembly District

Thank you for your invitation to present my advocacy to prevent Healthcare Associated Infections(HAI) in our Veteran’s Hospital’s interest in the development of some form of "Database of Best Practices for the Prevention of Healthcare Associated Infections" at the California Department of Public Health(CDPH).

The "need", California’s healthcare system is currently expensive and dangerous, HAI is a very large part of the expense and the cause of tens of thousands of serious injuries and deaths in California annually.

The "root cause", currently every healthcare facility in California is responsible to develop their own HAI prevention program and the catastrophic results are clearly stated in the currently funded surveillance system at the California Department of Public Health(CDPH). Due to the thousands of indigenous processes the surveillance system can do little more than identify and penalize poorly performing facilities. Training and turnover without some form of standard process is beyond my comprehension.

The "practical solution", adopt one proven process to be made available to all California healthcare facilities, hosted at the CDPH and covered by the freedom of information act, continually improved due to large scale implementation and feedback from the current surveillance system at the CDPH. The improved efficiencies of the participating healthcare facilities should encourage further participation.

Enclosed you will find a brief description of something close to a "Database of Best Practices for the Prevention of HAI" from the CDPH website, the inclusion of the process to prevent Centerline Associated Bloodstream Infections(CLABSI) that successfully prevented CLABSI for seven years is a significant step further in my opinion and should be the first "best practice" adapted be the State of California.

The inclusion of Anthem Blue Cross’s "Patient Safety First" program demonstrates the effective development and use of standardized processes on a large scale, now the University of California’s Medical system and Anthem Blue Cross have a plan to "collaborate" to further improve healthcare efficiencies and patient safety, "who will have access to these gains"?

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is awaiting and sometimes funding "best practices" being developed at the State level, the origin of the term "Best Practice" Funding is also available at the World Health Organization, their opinion "HAI will sooner than latter be the demise of the modern hospital"!

What to do? Could your office please deliver my request to the Honorable Governor Brown and corroborating information to the Honorable State Senator Monning and Honorable Governor Brown? "Let’s get healthy California" is a good start, California is far behind other states concerning the prevention of HAI, to help our Veteran’s, my advocacy will not breach the gates at the V.A. but good science will!

Michael H. Slavinski


The picture, Christmas with a U.S. Peace Corps kid, all hand made and a sory of their own1