CLABSI Study – A New Pathway to Reduce CLABSI in Hospitals

Central venous catheters (CVCs) are used for the administration of intravenous fluids, blood products, medications, and parenteral nutrition. They also provide access for hemodialysis and other forms of long-term treatment, such as chemotherapy.

Widespread and essential, CVCs are also a frequent cause of healthcare-associated bloodstream infections. It is estimated that 250,000 cases of central line–associated bloodstream infections (CLABSIs) occur in the U.S. every year. According to the CDC, CLABSIs are associated with a mortality rate of 12–25%. Each CLABSI episode costs approximately $22,000, which includes the burdens of additional diagnosis and treatment, and prolonged hospital stays.

CLABSI rates can be reduced, if not eliminated, by adherence to evidence-based protocols. National CLABSI rates have shown a 50% drop between 2008 and 2016. Several hospitals throughout the U.S. have managed to maintain a 0% CLABSI rate for months, even years, by following these protocols.

So why does CLABSI still happen? A major US health system employed the Amplifire training tool to acquire data on what its nurses know and don’t know about these protocols for managing CVCs, and to find and fix any misinformation the nurses held.

Knowledge and Confidence About CLABSI Before and After Amplifire

Observations

• 25,129 instances of CHM found and fixed
• 29,838 instances of uncertainty found and fixed
• The variation of knowledge was high, with some nurses quite misinformed and others showing confident mastery of the topic. The most knowledgeable were 100% confident and correct about CLABSI. The least show that misinformation occupied up to 60% percent of their knowledge.
• Nurses who were most misinformed or uncertain spent nearly a half hour in the module, whereas nurses who were most knowledgeable about CLABSI spent only 12 minutes.
• By the end of the course, 100% of the nurses who completed were confident and correct on all the information.