How Mandated Reporting Set Infection Rates On The Decline

Six years after the New York Department of Health started publishing hospital-acquired infection data as part of a public transparency agenda, the rates of most infections are trending downward.

With data on hospital-acquired infections (HAIs) published on individual facilities, the sixth annual report shows a 53 percent decrease in central-line bloodstream infections since 2007, when the program began, and a 14 percent decline in infections associated with colon surgery and 23 percent decline in infections associated with cardiac bypass surgery. 

New York's experience lends some evidence to a correlation Canadian researchers, writing in PLOS Medicine, found in Ontario: a "significant reduction" in hospital Clostridium difficile infection rates after the introduction of mandatory public reporting.