A handy infection prevention checklist and a free continuing education course on injection safety are just some of the resources included in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's new Guide to Infection Prevention for Outpatient Settings: Minimum Expectations for Safe Care.

"Repeated outbreaks resulting from unsafe practices, along with breaches of infection control noted in ambulatory surgical centers during inspections by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, indicate the need for better infection prevention across our entire health care system, including outpatient settings," says Michael Bell, MD, deputy director of the CDC's Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion, in a new release announcing the package of resources.

The 17-page "minimum expectations" guide does not present new information, but rather summarizes existing evidence-based CDC guidelines in an easy-to-read format.

Outpatient facilities are encouraged to use the new Infection Prevention Checklist to ensure that they have appropriate policies, procedures and supplies in place to facilitate safe care, as well as to assess individual staff members' adherence to proper infection prevention practices. The checklist is divided into 12 areas ranging from policies and training to hand hygiene and PPE to device reprocessing and sterilization.

Finally, the CDC in conjunction with the Safe Injection Practices Coalition is offering a free continuing medical education course on "Unsafe Injection Practices: Outbreaks, Incidents and Root Causes" via Medscape.org. Clinicians in all healthcare settings are eligible to take the video course.

Irene Tsikitas