Knowledge sharing among healthcare infection preventionists: the impact of public health professionals in a rural state

BMC Research Notes

Ruth Carrico²  Emily Just¹  Julio Ramirez²  W Paul McKinney¹  Philip M Polgreen³  Timothy Wiemken² 

[1] University of Louisville Center for Health Hazards Preparedness, 485 East Gray Street, Louisville, KY, 40202, USA;University of Louisville Division of Infectious Diseases, 501 East Broadway Suite 380, Louisville, KY, 40202, USA;University of Iowa Department of Infectious Diseases, 200 Hawkins Drive, Iowa City, IA, 52242, USA

关键词: Information;    Rural health;    Key player;    Social network;    Healthcare-associated infections;    Public health department;    Communication;    Knowledge sharing;   

Others  :  1166061
DOI  :  10.1186/1756-0500-5-387

 received in 2012-04-27, accepted in 2012-07-13,  发布年份 2012

【 摘 要 】

Background

Healthcare-associated infections are a major source of morbidity and mortality in the United States. Infection Preventionists (IPs) are healthcare workers tasked at overseeing the prevention and control of these infections, but they may have difficulties obtaining up-to-date information, primarily in rural states. The objective of this study was to evaluate the importance of public health involvement on the knowledge-sharing network of IPs in a rural state.

Findings

A total of 95 attendees completed our survey. The addition of public health professionals increased the density of the network, reduced the number of separate components of the network, and reduced the number of key players needed to contact nearly all of the other network members. All network metrics were higher for public health professionals than for IPs without public health involvement.

Conclusions

The addition of public health professionals involved in healthcare infection prevention activities augmented the knowledge sharing potential of the IPs in Iowa. Rural states without public health involvement in healthcare-associated infection (HAI) prevention efforts should consider the potential benefits of adding these personnel to the public health workforce to help facilitate communication of HAI-related information.

【 授权许可】

   
2012 Wiemken et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

【 图 表 】

Figure 1 .

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