JMIR Medical Informatics (Sep 2015)

A Web-Based, Hospital-Wide Health Care-Associated Bloodstream Infection Surveillance and Classification System: Development and Evaluation

  • Tseng, Yi-Ju,
  • Wu, Jung-Hsuan,
  • Lin, Hui-Chi,
  • Chen, Ming-Yuan,
  • Ping, Xiao-Ou,
  • Sun, Chun-Chuan,
  • Shang, Rung-Ji,
  • Sheng, Wang-Huei,
  • Chen, Yee-Chun,
  • Lai, Feipei,
  • Chang, Shan-Chwen

DOI
https://doi.org/10.2196/medinform.4171
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 3, no. 3
p. e31

Abstract

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BackgroundSurveillance of health care-associated infections is an essential component of infection prevention programs, but conventional systems are labor intensive and performance dependent. ObjectiveTo develop an automatic surveillance and classification system for health care-associated bloodstream infection (HABSI), and to evaluate its performance by comparing it with a conventional infection control personnel (ICP)-based surveillance system. MethodsWe developed a Web-based system that was integrated into the medical information system of a 2200-bed teaching hospital in Taiwan. The system automatically detects and classifies HABSIs. ResultsIn this study, the number of computer-detected HABSIs correlated closely with the number of HABSIs detected by ICP by department (n=20; r=.999 P<.001) and by time (n=14; r=.941; P<.001). Compared with reference standards, this system performed excellently with regard to sensitivity (98.16%), specificity (99.96%), positive predictive value (95.81%), and negative predictive value (99.98%). The system enabled decreasing the delay in confirmation of HABSI cases, on average, by 29 days. ConclusionsThis system provides reliable and objective HABSI data for quality indicators, improving the delay caused by a conventional surveillance system.