Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Comparative Study
. 2024 Sep 13;13(1):103.
doi: 10.1186/s13756-024-01465-7.

Assessing infection prevention and control structures in German hospitals after the COVID-19 pandemic using the WHO infection prevention and control assessment framework (IPCAF): results from 660 hospitals and comparison with a pre-pandemic survey

Ferenc Darius Rüther  1   2 , Alexander Gropmann  3   4 , Sonja Hansen  3   4 , Michael Behnke  3   4 , Christine Geffers  3   4 , Seven Johannes Sam Aghdassi  3   4   5
Affiliations
Comparative Study

Assessing infection prevention and control structures in German hospitals after the COVID-19 pandemic using the WHO infection prevention and control assessment framework (IPCAF): results from 660 hospitals and comparison with a pre-pandemic survey

Ferenc Darius Rüther et al. Antimicrob Resist Infect Control. .

Abstract

Background: The WHO Infection Prevention and Control Assessment Framework (IPCAF) is a standardized tool to assess infection prevention and control (IPC) structures in healthcare facilities. The IPCAF reflects the eight WHO core components (CC) of IPC. Besides facility self-assessment, the IPCAF can be used for national surveys, and repeated usage can aid in describing trends concerning IPC structures. A previous survey in over 700 German hospitals conducted in 2018, yielded an overall high IPC level in participating hospitals, albeit with potentials for improvement. In 2023, the survey was repeated to describe once again the state of IPC implementation in German hospitals and compare findings to data from 2018.

Methods: The German National Reference Center for the Surveillance of Nosocomial Infections (NRC) invited 1,530 German acute care hospitals participating in the national surveillance network "KISS", to complete a translated online version of the IPCAF between October 2023 and January 2024. The questionnaire-like nature of the IPCAF, where each answer corresponds to a number of points, allows for calculating an overall IPC score. Based on the overall score, hospitals were allocated to four different IPC levels: inadequate (0-200), basic (201-400), intermediate (401-600), and advanced (601-800). Aggregated scores were calculated and compared with results from 2018.

Results: Complete datasets from 660 hospitals were received and analyzed. The median overall IPCAF score was 692.5 (interquartile range: 642.5-737.5), with 572 hospitals (86.6%) classified as advanced, and 87 hospitals (13.2%) as intermediate. One hospital (0.2%) fell into the basic category. The overall median score was virtually unchanged when compared to 2018 (690; data from 736 hospitals). The median score for the CC on workload, staffing and bed occupancy was markedly higher (85 vs. 75), whereas the median score for the CC on multimodal strategies was slightly lower than in 2018 (75 vs. 80).

Conclusions: Repeated assessments of IPC structures at the national level with the IPCAF are feasible and a means to gain insights into the evolution of IPC structures. When comparing aggregated scores, a stable and high level of IPC key aspects in Germany was observed, with improvements over time in IPC indicators related to workload and staffing.

Keywords: IPCAF; Infection control; Infection control structures; Surveillance; Survey.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Seven Johannes Sam Aghdassi serves as an Associate Editor for Antimicrobial Resistance & Infection Control. The other authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Proportion of hospitals with different IPCAF scores in 2023 vs. 2018. Data from 660 German acute care hospitals in 2023 and 736 hospitals in 2018. Abbreviations: IPCAF Infection Prevention and Control Assessment Framework
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Boxplots displaying the median and range of IPCAF core component scores in 2023 vs. 2018. Data from 660 German acute care hospitals in 2023 and 736 hospitals in 2018. The boxplots display the distribution of scores per core component. The horizontal lines in the box represent the median, the top and bottom of the box represent the interquartile range, the whiskers illustrate the tenth and 90th percentile. Abbreviations: CC Core component, IPCAF Infection Prevention and Control Assessment Framework
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. World Health Organization. Guidelines on core components of infection prevention and control programmes at the national and acute health care facility level. 2016. Available from: https://iris.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665/251730/9789241549929-eng.pdf.... Accessed 05 Apr 2024. - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization. Infection Prevention and Control Assessment Framework. 2018. Available from: https://iris.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665/330072/WHO-HIS-SDS-2018.9-en.... Accessed 13 Mar 2024.
    1. Aghdassi SJS, Hansen S, Bischoff P, Behnke M, Gastmeier P. A national survey on the implementation of key infection prevention and control structures in German hospitals: results from 736 hospitals conducting the WHO Infection Prevention and Control Assessment Framework (IPCAF). Antimicrob Resist Infect Control. 2019;8:73. 10.1186/s13756-019-0532-4 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Tomczyk S, Twyman A, de Kraker MEA, Coutinho Rehse AP, Tartari E, Toledo JP, et al. The first WHO global survey on infection prevention and control in health-care facilities. Lancet Infect Dis. 2022;22(6):845–56. 10.1016/S1473-3099(21)00809-4 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Aghdassi SJS, Grisold A, Wechsler-Fordos A, Hansen S, Bischoff P, Behnke M, et al. Evaluating infection prevention and control programs in Austrian acute care hospitals using the WHO infection prevention and control assessment framework. Antimicrob Resist Infect Control. 2020;9(1):92. 10.1186/s13756-020-00761-2 - DOI - PMC - PubMed

Publication types

LinkOut - more resources