Laziest possible post about the new CMS rule

I am on vacation. Last week I biked across Iowa with 9,999 other people (see photo below), and I’m now in Michigan, recovering from my bike ride across Iowa. So I haven’t done much deep thinking about the new CMS rule related to healthcare associated infections. From what I understand, participation in the Medicare program (at least receipt of full payment) will soon require surveillance and reporting (through NHSN) of CLABSI (beginning in 2011; ICU only) and SSI (beginning in 2012). The rates will eventually be reported via the hospital compare website. This doesn’t mean a lot to hospitals that already perform CLABSI and SSI surveillance, unless they don’t currently report through NHSN, in which case they’ll have to get enrolled.

We’ve already blogged about pitfalls in public reporting, and about problems with the NHSN definitions, validation, etc. So I really don’t have anything new to say about this rule. I refer all interested readers to a six-part series at Safe Healthcare (only 2 posts so far, 4 to come) on the new rule.