13 South Carolina Hospitals Select Innovative Infection Control Technology to Better Protect Patients, Meet Public Reporting Requirements

January 31, 2008

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- The Premier Inc. healthcare alliance today announced that 13 South Carolina hospitals have joined the nearly 200 hospitals that have selected Premiers SafetySurveillor as their Web-based tool used to detect and alert staff of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs). SafetySurveillor protects patients by continuously tracking HAIs and antibiotic use to monitor prevention and control activities.

South Carolina hospitals that selected SafetySurveillor to better protect patients while meeting public reporting requirements include:

Bon Secours St. Francis Health System, Greenville two hospitals;

Greenville Hospital System, Greenville five hospitals;

Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston;

McLeod Health, Florence;

Palmetto Health, Columbia three hospitals;

Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System, Spartanburg.

State law requires the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC) to establish a system for compiling infection data from various medical facilities and to coordinate the activities of an advisory committee. As of Feb. 1, 2008, Medical facilities will report on surgical site infections and central line related bloodstream infections, and later on other categories as decided by DHEC in consultation with the committee.

SafetySurveillor helps hospitals collect data needed to meet state-mandated public reporting of certain HAIs, including prophylactic antibiotic start and stop times and screening for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Clostridium difficile, some of the most common and harmful infections found in hospitals today. Due to the large volume of clinical data that needs to be analyzed, many hospitals have resources to do targeted surveillance of high-risk patients only. With the automated SafetySurveillor system, hospitals have the ability to detect HAIs, alert staff and facilitate timely intervention to reduce and prevent infections.

SafetySurveillor has also been chosen by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as an HAI surveillance system software vendor participant in developing a standards-based solution for transmission of HAI data from existing commercial software systems to the agency's National Healthcare Safety Network.

Premier SafetySurveillor is integrated into the Premier Performance Suite, which includes benchmarking, reporting analysis and real-time surveillance of clinical, safety, financial, operational, labor productivity and supply data. The Premier Performance Suite is powered by the Perspective database, the nations largest integrated clinical, financial and operational comparative database, providing patient-level detail to identify opportunities for improvement in clinical quality and efficiency.

Source: Premier Inc.