Cardinal Health, a global provider of products and services that improve the safety and productivity of health care, today announced a new service to help hospitals combat methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections that are responsible for an estimated 94,000 life-threatening conditions and 18,650 deaths annually in the U.S.
Cardinal Health is deploying a new MRSA Scorecard to hospitals that monitor infections using the company's MedMined services. The new scorecard provides a hospital-wide view of MRSA, allowing infection control practitioners to track the types and locations of MRSA infections throughout the hospital. The MRSA Scorecard uses Cardinal Health's patent-pending Nosocomial Infection Marker (NIM) methodology, which allows hospitals to identify patients who have tested positive for the bacteria and distinguish between those who likely acquired the infection in the hospital. Through this real-time view, hospitals can rapidly dispatch resources to limit the spread of infections.
The MRSA scorecard is available to all hospitals using MedMined services and will be offered free of charge for four months through a sponsorship program from BD (Becton, Dickinson and Company).
"The MRSA Scorecard will help hospitals make evidence-based decisions about the most appropriate way to respond to MRSA in their facilities," said Patrick Hymel, MD, vice president and medical director for Cardinal Health's MedMined services. "This new tool enables a comprehensive and consistent approach to preventing these dangerous infections."