12 steps to address SHEA "midlife crisis'
Suggestions for change at SHEA meeting
As the field of infection prevention undergoes sweeping changes, the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA) must reassess its role and redefine its mission, an epidemiologist said recently in Orlando at the group's annual meeting.
"How do we broaden our outlook to include the public and other stakeholders?" said Michael Edmond, MD, a health care epidemiologist at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center in Richmond. He suggested 12 strategies:
- Re-examine the mission and become more proactive.
- Actively seek out opportunities to educate the public on health care-associated infections (HAIs).
- Develop a program for health care worker education emphasizing positive aspects of HAI risk reduction.
- Aggressively articulate SHEA experience to stakeholders such as The Joint Commission, CMS, and legislators.
- Target hospital CEOs for education on health care-associated infections, including the value of hospital epidemiologists in infection control programs, and the need for investment in program infrastructure. Partner with infection control colleagues to set realistic goals for reduction of HAIs.
- Help SHEA members acquire new skills, such as team building and project implementation.
- Create a blueprint of gaps in the science from which research priorities can be identified.
- Demand critical examination of evidence for practices and advocate linking expectation for compliance to the strength of the evidence.
- Create an infection control curriculum with competencies for medical students and house officers that can be distributed nationally.
- Advocate funding for research on HAIs and for training new hospital epidemiologists.
- Consider certification as a mechanism to establish legitimacy.
- Don't sell out. Maintain credibility by pointing out conflicts of interest with industry.
Article Limit Reached
You have reached your article limit for the month. Subscribe now to access this article plus other member-only content.
- Award-winning Medical Content
- Latest Advances & Development in Medicine
- Unbiased Content