• E-mail
• Print
• RSS

Q&A: How to prevent hospital-acquired pressure ulcers/injuries

Healthcare Life Safety Compliance, September 2, 2020

This is an excerpt from a member only article. To read the article in its entirety, please login or subscribe to Healthcare Life Safety Compliance.

Klaus Nether of the Joint Commission Center for Transforming Healthcare discusses prevention

by Brian Ward

Each year, 2.5 million patients suffer from pressure ulcers and injuries, with 60,000 dying from complications. To put that into some context, in 2018 there were fewer suicide attempts (1.4 million) and deaths (48,000) than there were pressure ulcer cases and deaths.

Patients on ventilators who are unable to reposition themselves are among the most vulnerable to pressure ulcers. Between the large number of COVID-19 patients needing hospitalization and the upcoming flu season, many facilities will have more patients than ever whom they’ll need to keep from developing bedsores and ulcers.

Klaus Nether, DHS, CSSMBB, is the executive director of high reliability product delivery at the Joint Commission Center for Transforming Healthcare, which has made preventing hospital-acquired pressure ulcers and injuries (HAPU/I) a priority for the past two years. He answered questions via email about the Center’s efforts to prevent HAPU/I.

This is an excerpt from a member only article. To read the article in its entirety, please login or subscribe to Healthcare Life Safety Compliance.

• E-mail to a Colleague
• Print
• RSS
• Archive