From infection control to South Park . . .
CMS is trying to tie hospital-acquired infections to reimbursement. Of course, ratcheting down on reimbursement only reduces the available financial resources to make meaningful improvements to the environment that might help control infections.
Talk about vicious cycles. I guess it didn’t take too long to abandon the nonpunitive vision for healthcare.
The whole world doesn’t wash their hands often enough, myself included, but sometimes you have to take time out from handwashing to actually do work. (That’s probably unnecessarily glib, but I was up late last night watching episodes of South Park, which generally does not bring out the more charitable side of my personality.)
About the Author: Steve MacArthur is a consultant for The Greeley Company, a division of HCPro. He brings 30 years of healthcare management and consulting experience to his work with hospitals, physician offices, and ambulatory care facilities across the country. He is the author of HCPro's Hospital Safety Director's Handbook and is contributing editor for Briefings on Hospital Safety. Contact Steve at 
D. LaHoda | Aug 28, 2009 | Reply
Steve, I appreciate your vicious cycle analysis, but I’ve been around healthcare a long time and can recall lots of things “we” used to charge for or over-charge for only because…we could.
I know that healthcare likes to claim that it is unlike other sectors in the economy, but being reimbursed for infections (problems) caused in or by a facility is something other businesses would never attempt, except in a cartoon world. Maybe not in South Park, but can’t you imagine Beavis and Butt-head sitting on the couch and making a self-serving argument for being paid for creating and then treating HAIs?