A blood stream infection is considered to be associated with a central line if the line was in use during the 48 hour period before the development of the infection.

A central line infection can occur when bacteria &/or fungi enters the blood stream causing the patient to become ill.  The bacteria can come from a variety of sources (ie skin, wounds, environment, etc.) though it may often come from the patient’s skin.

 

This indicator is being tracked for Intensive Care patients through daily data collection into the Critical Care Information System (CCIS).  Once the data is validated, public reporting is done quarterly.  Any patient admitted to the ICU with an existing CLI is excluded from the data.

 

At LWDH strategies have been implemented to prevent and monitor CLI rates.   Tracking CLI rates over time will provide us with helpful information that we can use to make quality improvements.   

 

Calculation of CLI rates:

 

Number of new Blood Stream Infections diagnosed in ICU (after 48 hours of central line placement)   X 1000

Total number of Central Line days for ICU patients