New data published by federal and state health officials shows that U.S. hospitals are “making progress in cutting healthcare-associated infections (HAIs).” CIDRAP has the news.

The data shows that only one in 38 hospital patients had at least one HAI on any given day, down from one in 25 in 2011. Treating these infections costs hospitals billions of dollars annually, and incidence rates spiked during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The CDC and CMS have “prioritized HAI reduction over the past two decades.” Those efforts were showing promising results until 2020, and higher HAI rates continued through 2021.

Overall, the study showed that “355 (2.6%) of 13,653 patients in US hospitals in 2023 had at least one HAI on any given day, compared with 394 (3.2%) of 12,299 patients in 2015. Among the 151 hospitals that participated in both surveys, after adjustments were made for other factors, patients in 2023 were 27% less likely to have an HAI than patients in 2015.” This was the case despite the fact that “patients in the 2023 survey were older and had longer hospital stays than those in the 2015 survey.”

The biggest contributors to lower prevalence of HAIs were reductions in CDI, CLABSIs, and CAUTIs. The study still estimated that “518,000 HAIs occurred at US hospitals in 2023, and rates of pneumonia and SSIs did not change much from the 2015 survey. Furthermore, 61% of the HAIs in 2023 were not associated with medical devices or procedures.” Those types of HAIs can be more challenging to prevent.