£50m Funding For Cleaner Hospitals

Secretary of State for Health Alan Johnson today announced £50 million extra funding to tackle healthcare associated infections (HCAIs) such as MRSA and C.difficile.

Bug-busting infection Improvement Teams will double in size so that any Trust that is not on course to meet the 2008 MRSA target or has a significant number of patients with C.difficile, will have access to a team of experts to help them reduce infection.

Strategic Health Authority Directors of Nursing will each receive £5 million. Working with PCTs, they will make sure that front-line clinicians make the changes which help them in the fight against HCAIs.

Health Secretary, Alan Johnson, said:

"Tackling MRSA and other healthcare associated infections is one of my immediate priorities.

"NHS staff have worked hard to slow the increase in C.difficile reports from 17 per cent to 8 per cent, whilst reducing MRSA bloodstream infections in the three months to December last year by 20 per cent, compared with 2003-04. This is a step in the right direction but clearly more must be done to improve the quality of care and patient safety.

"I am therefore asking each Director of Nursing in every Strategic Health Authority to make sure that frontline clinicians are supported in the work they do to reduce infection and to provide a clean, safe environment.

"On top of this I am doubling the size of the DH infection Improvement Team so that all Trusts struggling to reduce infections can have access to experts in prevention and control of infection."

Chief Nursing Officer, Christine Beasley, said:

"I know from my visits to the NHS that some frontline clinicians have trouble accessing modern equipment. This announcement will help frontline NHS staff make a real difference to infection rates by giving them the power to make the changes they know will help patients.

Since last February, the Department's Improvement Teams have successfully helped around 70 NHS Trusts to identify and implement changes to bring their infection rates down. Most trusts visited have seen significant improvements with reductions in MRSA rates of between 16 and 34 per cent. The teams have recently extended their work to cover C. difficile infections.

The Improvement Teams are groups of experts such as doctors, nurses, microbiologists, infection control practitioners and service improvement experts who work with NHS organisations to:

- Diagnose the issues which need to be tackled if there is to be better prevention and control of MRSA bloodstream infections and C. difficile infections
- Develop action plans with realistic implementation timescales
- Implement agreed plans and put in place management and support arrangements that facilitate sustained improvement
- Act as a catalyst for other Trusts and demonstrate that by adopting best practice rates can be reduced to lower levels at a faster rate.

For all of the latest tools for tackling healthcare associated infections visit Clean-safe-care.nhs.uk.