To observe patient care across hemodialysis facilities enrolled in the National Opportunity to Improve Infection Control in ESRD (end-stage renal disease) (NOTICE) project in order to evaluate adherence to evidence-based practices aimed at prevention of infection.

Thirty-four hemodialysis facilities were randomly selected from among 772 facilities in 4 end-stage renal disease participating networks. Facility selection was stratified on dialysis organization affiliation, size, socioeconomic status, and urban/rural status.

Trained infection control evaluators used an infection control worksheet to observe 73 distinct infection control practices at the hemodialysis facilities, from October 1, 2011, through January 31, 2012.

There was considerable variation in infection control practices across enrolled facilities. Overall adherence to recommended practices was 68% (range, 45%–92%) across all facilities. Overall adherence to expected hand hygiene practice was 72% (range, 10%–100%). Compliance to hand hygiene before and after procedures was high; however, during procedures hand hygiene compliance averaged 58%. Use of chlorhexidine as the specific agent for exit site care was 19% overall but varied from 0% to 35% by facility type. The 8 checklists varied in the frequency of perfect performance from 0% for meeting every item on the checklist for disinfection practices to 22% on the arteriovenous access practices at initiation.

Our findings suggest that there are many areas for improvement in hand hygiene and other infection prevention practices in end-stage renal disease. These NOTICE project findings will help inform the development of a larger quality improvement initiative at dialysis facilities.

Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol 2015;36(7):802–806

Antibiograms have effectively improved antibiotic prescribing in acute-care settings; however, their effectiveness in skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) is currently unknown.

To develop SNF-specific antibiograms and identify opportunities to improve antibiotic prescribing.

Cross-sectional and pretest-posttest study among residents of 3 Maryland SNFs.

Antibiograms were created using clinical culture data from a 6-month period in each SNF. We also used admission clinical culture data from the acute care facility primarily associated with each SNF for transferred residents. We manually collected all data from medical charts, and antibiograms were created using WHONET software. We then used a pretest-posttest study to evaluate the effectiveness of an antibiogram on changing antibiotic prescribing practices in a single SNF. Appropriate empirical antibiotic therapy was defined as an empirical antibiotic choice that sufficiently covered the infecting organism, considering antibiotic susceptibilities.

We reviewed 839 patient charts from SNF and acute care facilities. During the initial assessment period, 85% of initial antibiotic use in the SNFs was empirical, and thus only 15% of initial antibiotics were based on culture results. Fluoroquinolones were the most frequently used empirical antibiotics, accounting for 54.5% of initial prescribing instances. Among patients with available culture data, only 35% of empirical antibiotic prescribing was determined to be appropriate. In the single SNF in which we evaluated antibiogram effectiveness, prevalence of appropriate antibiotic prescribing increased from 32% to 45% after antibiogram implementation; however, this was not statistically significant (P = .32).

Implementation of antibiograms may be effective in improving empirical antibiotic prescribing in SNFs.