A new evidence-based toolkit can help you reduce catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs) at your center. The toolkit from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) combines clinical interventions and best practices for infection prevention with behavior change elements that promote leadership involvement, improvement in safety culture, teamwork, and communication, and sustainability.

Its user-friendly educational modules, guides, and tools can help your facility advance from the “what to do” to the “how to do it.”

The modules are customizable to local needs. They include:

• Using the Comprehensive Long-Term Care Safety Toolkit
• Senior Leader Engagement
• Staff Empowerment
• Teamwork and Communication
• Resident and Family Engagement
• Sustainability
• Indwelling Urinary Catheter Use and Care
• Urine Culturing and Antibiotic Stewardship

The toolkit is based on the experiences of more than 450 long term care facilities across the country that participated in an AHRQ-funded project and successfully reduced CAUTI. The new toolkit uses strategies from AHRQ’s Comprehensive Unit-based Safety Program (CUSP), which has reduced CAUTI as well as central line-associated bloodstream infections in hospitals.