The primary aim of VICNISS is to minimise the number of infections that are associated with healthcare in Victoria.

IN THIS EDITION

• Private Hospitals Surveillance – Information Day
• Ageing and Skin Health Seminar
• National Hand Hygiene Initiative Audit Three 2018
• Hand Hygiene Auditor Training and Validation  
• 2018 Health Care Worker Influenza Vaccination Campaign
• 2018 Aged care resident vaccination reports

  Introduction to HAI Surveillance in Private Hospitals - Information Day

SAVE THE DATE

Two dates are available to choose from:  

Wednesday 5 December or Monday 10 December

VICNISS are conducting an information day to assist the commencement of healthcare associated infections surveillance in private hospitals and discuss the rollout.  Information will include Department of Health and Human Services requirements, Introduction to HAI Surveillance and VICNISS as well as Staphylococcus aureus bloodstream infection  and Central line associated bloodstream infections surveillance education sessions. 

Ageing and Skin Health Seminar

The Ageing and Skin Health Seminar was held on Tuesday 25th September at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity and from the feedback we have received it was a resounding success.  Thank you to all those who attended the day and as well as our expert speakers who were both informative and passionate in their delivery of the content matter. Some of the presentations will be available in the website in due course.  Please keep an eye on our website for updates.

National Hand Hygiene Initiative Audit Three 2018

Once finished please ensure that you click the ‘Submit for Approval’ button which will change the status of your audit from Active to Pending Approval. Your audit will remain at ‘Pending Approval’ until validation of the data has been completed.This includes checking the number of moments submitted and that all acute departments are included at least annually e.g. Emergency Department.

To submit your data:

• click on the ‘Audits’ tab at the top of the page
• click on the name of the audit period under the blue line
• the ‘Submit for Approval’ button is at the bottom of the page, underneath the list of sessions

Hand Hygiene Auditor Training and Validation  

It is the responsibility of each Organisation Administrator to ensure all their auditors submitting data to HHA have completed the auditor online learning package and collected 100 moments in the last twelve months. Auditors who do not meet these criteria are required to follow the Lapsed Auditor Pathway:

This is a HHA requirement, and if not met will result in the auditor being removed from the Hand Hygiene Compliance Application (HHCApp), resulting in an inability to enter data.

Please remember that the pre-workshop online learning module is a mandatory component of auditor training, so each trained auditor needs to have this in their LMS profile when HHA are reviewing their status as an auditor.

It is also important to ensure that all newly trained auditors are registered as having completed their training on the HHA auditor register:

2018 Health Care Worker Influenza Vaccination Campaign

The HCW Influenza Vaccination campaign is over for another year. Well done to you all on achieving the rates you did. 
Both the acute and aged care HCW Influenza Vaccination Reports are now available via the VICNISS website.

2018 Aged Care Resident Vaccination Reports

All Infection Control Practitioners working in public health services will be notified via email when the resident and influenza/ pneumococcal/ herpes zoster vaccination reports are able to be accessed. We will ask the ICPs to forward this email to staff working in their public sector residential aged care services. Currently there are no state-wide targets.