News: Professional association calls on Congress to improve infection control in nursing homes

The Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) recently sent a letter to Congress addressing some of the major issues occurring in nursing homes as it relates to questions of safety, staffing, and federal funding, according to HealthLeaders.

The letter, sent on June 16, 2023, noted that despite years of Congressional reports “sounding the alarm about infection control lapses in nursing homes,” and despite the overwhelming evidence suggesting that governmental assistance could improve infection rates in hospitals, there remains an “astonishing lack of attention” in resolving these public health issues.

According to APIC, which represents over 15,000 infection preventionists across the country and across different care settings, there are approximately 687,700 healthcare-associated infections (HAI) in U.S. acute care hospitals every year, with 72,000 HAI-related deaths. APIC also noted that in some areas like long-term facilities, HAIs are occurring at a rate of anywhere between one to three million infections per year.

To rectify the situation, the APIC letter issued the following policy recommendations:

• Adequate levels of infection prevention and control staffing: Noting that governmental agencies have caused the IPC to be “under-resourced and put on the back burner,” APIC called for federal funding to support the creation of more certified, full-time infection preventionists with specialized training and expertise.
• Appropriately funded surveyors by staff educated in core infection prevention and control principles: Citing a Senate Aging Committee report entitled “Uninspected and Neglected: Nursing Home Inspection Agencies are Severely Understaffed, Putting Residents at Risk,” which found that the nursing home surveyor workforce has been faced with chronic staff vacancies and inexperience, APIC emphasized the need for adequate funding of nursing home surveys and proposed a CMS standardized training program for new surveyors in infection prevention and control.
• Routine, transparent, HAI surveillance in nursing homes: APIC argued that it was crucial to continue building upon the reporting requirements issued during the COVID-19 pandemic, when nursing homes were required to provide comprehensive data to the National Healthcare Safety Network regarding HAI surveillance measures and drug-resistant pathogens.
• Federally funded HAI training by qualified personnel: APIC also called for the creation of minimum competency requirements, like a long-term care certification in infection prevention or a certification in infection prevention and control, for those training in infection prevention and control.

Editor’s note: To read the HealthLeaders article, click here. To read the Senate Aging Committee report, click here. To read the APIC letter, click here.