Data released today by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) show continued progress in improving patient safety, a signal that initiatives led by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) are helping to make care safer. National efforts to reduce hospital-acquired conditions, such as adverse drug events and injuries from falls, helped prevent an estimated 8,000 deaths and save $2.9 billion between 2014 and 2016, according to the report.
The AHRQ National Scorecard on Hospital-Acquired Conditionsestimates that 350,000 hospital-acquired conditions were avoided and the rate was reduced by 8 percent from 2014 to 2016. Federal experts note that the gains in safety among hospital patients echoed earlier successes, including 2.1 million hospital-acquired conditions avoided between 2010 and 2014.
CMS has set a goal of reducing hospital-acquired conditions by 20 percent from 2014 through 2019. Through the work of the Hospital Improvement Innovation Networks (HIINs), CMS drives this aim through intensive, focused quality improvement assistance to more than 4,000 of the nation’s 5,000 hospitals by spreading best practices in harm reduction. The HIINs, together with federal agencies, private partners, and patient advocacy organizations, work collaboratively to make hospital care safer. Once the 20 percent reduction goal is met, AHRQ projects that during 2015 through 2019 there would be 1.8 million fewer patients with hospital-acquired conditions, resulting in 53,000 fewer deaths and saving $19.1 billion in hospital costs from 2015 through 2019.
Examples of hospital-acquired conditions include adverse drug events, catheter-associated urinary tract infections, central-line associated bloodstream infections, pressure injuries, and surgical site infections, among others.