Reducing Hospital-Acquired Infections through Better Hand Hygiene

Over 1.7 million hospital-acquired infections annually. 99,000 deaths from hospital-acquired infections annually.

The Source of the Problem
Caregivers, visitors and other hospital staff are not practicing the hand hygiene that is required to prevent these infections. Additionally, hospitals are concerned about the effect and increase in hospital-acquired infections may have in the future on their reimbursement and on their accreditation.

Click here to read more.

ISHE May Conference

The annual ISHE State Conference this week is fully booked. We are very excited about the informational sessions that are lined up for the conference this year. The presenters include: Andrew Quirk (Skanska), Rock R. Kaiser (Sustainable Steam & Water Solutions, Inc.), Brian A. Veeneman (Hall Render), Hill-Rom, Spencer Grover (IHA) and Tim Adams (ASHE). We look seeing everyone who signed up for the event out at JAWACDAH Farm!

We Need Your Help to Encourage Participation in the ASHE Energy Survey!
Deadline Extended

ASHE is conducting a comprehensive survey of health care facilities nationwide to quantify new trends in energy use and identify key drivers of energy consumption in hospitals and outpatient facilities. We will use the survey findings to provide members with information to help you reduce energy costs, improve your facility's operating margin, and protect the environment.

We will also share anonymous data from this survey with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), working with them to update ENERGY STAR® benchmarks for acute care hospitals and possibly expand the scoring system to include other health care building types. With more than 2,800 hospitals employing EPA's Portfolio Manager to benchmark energy performance, it has become the industry standard for tracking and managing energy use in our facilities.

We would like to ask your help in getting this message to all of the members of your chapter. The success of our effort will largely depend on the number of responses received. Please share this appeal for data through your e-mail network and your Web site and include the link to the ASHE Web site at http://www.ashe.org/ashe/facilities/energysurvey.html.

All survey data submitted will remain confidential.

The deadline for completing this survey is May 24, 2010. Submit your survey response by e-mailing your file to ASHEenergy@aha.org.