Barbara Bush, R.N., C.I.C., Crestwood Infection Control Coordinator, said the new benchmarking tool helps manage and prevent infections from occurring within the hospital.

As infection control coordinator, Bush is responsible for identifying areas of opportunity to reduce the risk of infection including educational programming for employees, patients and visitors. Just recently, Bush successfully initiated a urinary tract infection education campaign and was able to reduce urinary tract infection related to catheters by 50 percent as well as a patient safety campaign where alcohol-based hand sanitizing units were placed throughout the hospital for easy accessibility to all employees, physicians and visitors.

“At Crestwood, infection prevention is a top priority and we take great measures to ensure that our patients receive safe and effective medical treatment with a reduced risk of acquiring a health care-associated infection during their stay,” Bush said. “The MedMined benchmarking tool enables hospitals to track and measure quality of care improvements.”

The MedMined benchmarking tool graphs the incidence of health care-associated infections in all of the units in a hospital as a visual representation of the current infection rate compared to its peers. The tool also indicates whether the infection rate in each unit is improving or not, making it easy for hospitals to identity areas of success and opportunities for improvement.

For more information about Crestwood Medical Center visit www.crestwoodmedcenter.com.