For years, efforts to reduce central-line associated bloodstream infection (CLABSI) rates have focused on relatively complex initiatives – including “bundles” of evidence-based practices and technologies that together create multi-layered protection against infections. Now, the early results of a prospective, peer-reviewed clinical trial suggest that the use of a simple but ingeniously designed device can contribute to improved disinfection and allow for reduced CLABSIs.
That device – SwabCap® by Excelsior Medical – is also known as a disinfection cap. SwabCap supplements manual disinfection of IV connectors, long thought to be a weak point in CLABSI prevention because the method is subject to variation and noncompliance. The study results were recently reported at the annual meeting of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA).
Early results of the prospective, peer-reviewed clinical trial demonstrated that SwabCap® improved disinfection and allowed for reduced central-line associated bloodstream infection rates of more than 79%. Those improvements were seen in the four-hospital NorthShore University HealthSystem (Evanston, Ill.) after SwabCap was implemented for use on all central lines.
Notably, the gains were made even though the hospitals already had a low rate CLABSI rate of 1.95 per 1,000 catheter days before SwabCap was tried.
NorthShore also studied the device’s effectiveness a second way: it compared the density of colony-forming units (CFUs) of bacteria in blood samples when SwabCap was used to CFUs in samples when it wasn’t. During the SwabCap phase of the research, contaminated samples were 75% less dense with bacteria.
The new data is the most extensive ever gathered on SwabCap. The device is in use at multiple institutions, sometimes allowing for a drop in infection rates that is even more dramatic than at NorthShore. More at http://www.swabcap.com.