Intensive care unit rounding checklists to reduce catheter-associated urinary tract infections

To assess whether the implementation of an intensive care unit (ICU) rounding checklist reduces the number of catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs).

Retrospective before-and-after study that took place between March 2013 and February 2017.

An academic community hospital 16-bed, mixed surgical, cardiac, medical ICU.

Participants were all patients admitted to the adult mixed ICU and had a diagnosis of CAUTI.

Initiation of an ICU rounding checklist that prompts physicians to address any use of urinary catheters with analysis comparing the preintervention period before roll out of the rounding checklist versus the postintervention periods.

There were 19 CAUTIs and 9,288 urinary catheter days (2.04 CAUTIs per 1,000 catheter days). The catheter utilization ratio increased in the first year after the intervention (0.67 vs 0.60; P = .0079), then decreased in the second year after the intervention (0.53 vs 0.60; P = .0992) and in the third year after the intervention (0.53 vs 0.60; P = .0224). The rate of CAUTI (ie, CAUTI per 1,000 urinary catheter days) decreased from 4.62 before the checklist was implemented to 2.12 in the first year after the intervention (P = .2104). The CAUTI rate was 0.45 in the second year (P = .0275) and 0.96 in the third year (P = .0532).

Our study suggests that utilization of a daily rounding checklist is associated with a decrease in the rates of CAUTI in ICU patients. Incorporating a rounding checklist is feasible in the ICU.