Evaluation of Science developed by the HAITooL project: A toolkit to prevent, manage, and control Health Care associated infections

• Autor(a) principal: Rocha Baião, Bernardo
• Data de Publicação: 2019
• Outros Autores: Velez Lapão, Luís
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://doi.org/10.25761/anaisihmt.263

Demographic and epidemiological changes have led to the need of applying scientific advances in clinical practice. Despite all the evidence, good practice is not yet a reality in health systems. The difficulty in applying these practices regarding the health professionals, resides in the many cultural barriers, in the available information management, and in the lack of interinstitutional collaboration.Healthcare Associated Infections (HAIs) are one of the major causes of morbidity and mortality, accounting for about 37,000 deaths per year in Europe. Antibiotics are important in HAIs control, but inadequate prescription leads to increased antimicrobial resistance.Antibiotic Stewardship Programs contribute to the optimization of antimicrobial therapy, ensuring the proper use of antibiotics and minimizing side effects. Strategies based on surveillance and monitoring systems are an important tool for the implementation of Antibiotic Stewardship. Following the whole process of bringing innovation to health organizations, applying scientific evidence in the local reality, the HAITool scientific project (an information system with the aim of supporting clinical decision) emerged. In the present study, the development of this scientific project and its impact on health systems were analyzed and evaluated. A timeline of the HAITool scientific project was built to understand how it developed and how it contributed to scientific development.HAITool was also evaluated through interviews with key people in the project to analyze their implementation, their effects and their clinical impact.The results demonstrate that research takes a long time to reach an effective impact in society due to the many attempts and errors that occurred over time. Despite all the barriers in the implementation of this project, from healthcare professionals to the hospital administration through technical issues, over time this system has demonstrated that it is clearly an innovation with regards to patient safety and against the Public Health problem.