Date: 2007-06-05
Speaker: TIM MURPHY (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Pennsylvania

Mr. Chairman. I am here -to talk about a sad but true problem in our health care institutions in this country.-and. that is this. The Centers for. Disease Control tells us in any given year some 2 million people will catch an infection while either in their hospital or health care center. Some 90.000 people will die. and some $50 billion is spent on this each year in our hospitals. Now this chart here depicts what we have as of this evening. 853.747 cases so far. over 38.000 deaths and over $21 billion already spent as of today. These are bacteria. viruses. fungi and parasites that cause these common hospital infections. Most common are influenza. flu or colds. The thing about this is so many can be prevented. but a huge problem among the bacteria types. some 70 percent of the bacteria are resistant to at least one medication. There is a huge problem in American hospitals. which is causing so many deaths and a big part of our health care costs. Now these microorganisms can be present when a patient comes in. and thats why its so important to understand how the staff. the hospital staff. the doctors. the visitors. the patients themselves need to adhere to some special procedures in order to prevent this problem from occurring and killing so many and costing us so much on our health care dollars. For example. diseases are passed on by poor hygiene from poor hand washing. clothes that are not necessarily clean on even the doctors. nurses and visitors. unclean equipment. catheters that are left in too long that lead to urinary tract infection. respiratory infections from those with colds or flu who are around patients. bed sores. The list goes on and on. This is not rocket science how we prevent this. and some estimates are as high as 25 or 30 percent or more of things. such as methicillin or resistant Staphylococcus Aureus can be prevented by hand washing before and after contact with any patient. Many of these diseases can be prevented by sterilizing all equipment used with patients. including making sure that hospital staffs have clean stethoscopes. otoscopes. thermometers. et cetera. making sure they clean up after every procedure. the proper use of antibiotics. pretesting patients on admission to evaluate the presence of an infection. wearing masks if someone is suspected of having some illness. using infectioncontrol boards at hospitals to monitor and manage patients. empowering staff to stop or intervene on any procedure when clean rules. are violated. and using aggressive educational. campaigns for staff and visitors in the hospital. The point is it can be done. Yes. indeed. it can be done. As a matter of fact. Allegheny Hospital in Pennsylvania reduced the rate of central lineacquired infections from 19 to almost zero within 90 days through staff training and control. A major teaching hospital -in Saint Louis found that they saved costs up to $1.5 million. Mercy Hospital in Oklahoma performed 400 surgeries without any infections. The VA Pittsburgh Healthcare system has reduced MRSA infections by 85 percent in an inpatient surgical unit because they paid attention to these things. . Now here is one of the sad truths in America. Hospitals dont have to report when they have infections. Although 13 States are considering legislation. only 6 States require reporting of health care associated infections: Florida. Illinois. Missouri. New York. -Pennsylvania and Virginia. "Pennsylvania is the only State that makes its information available to the public. It is time we change this. I have introduced H.R. 1174. the Healthy Hospital Act. to encourage others to reduce and eliminate these deadly infections and to take some of the savings from this and set aside 10 percent to allow the Secretary of Health to use this for grants back to hospitals that reduce their infection rates to zero. We have got to transform our health care system into what it needs to be: an affordable. accessible. quality health care system that focuses on patient safety. patient qualify and patient choice. But in order to do that. we need to have this information available. Now. another sad truth. While I have been speaking. the number of cases has gone up. While I have been speaking. another person has died in the hospital. While I have been speaking. the costs have gone up $100.000. Something is terribly wrong with this system. We know -hospitals can clean this up. We also need to know that we need to stop wasting our health care dollars on preventable infections. Lets join together as a Nation and pass H.R. 1174.