Infection Prevention Control 3 Critical Challenges Explained

An infection prevention and control program must deal with emerging pathogens and antimicrobial resistance, constraints on facility resourcing, and surveillance and reporting requirements. By implementing infection prevention strategies designed to standardize processes and optimize patient outcomes, a hospital facility can face these three critical challenges head on. Emerging infectious diseases can spread rapidly and gain momentum to become endemic in certain areas or cross international boundaries, as most recently demonstrated with the COVID-19 pandemic. Antimicrobial-resistant infections can also quickly spread and are proven to be difficult, if not impossible to treat. Newly emerging infectious diseases, including but not limited to those pathogens conferring resistance often initially present with very little information on their modes of transmission, how to best detect/diagnose them, how to treat them,... This introduces significant challenges for infection prevention and control programs aiming to implement best practices to prevent and control spread.

In addition, emerging infectious diseases pose a significant risk to everyone, including healthcare workers, while information is still being discovered on how to best protect individuals and prevent exposures. In these scenarios, facilities must be prepared to respond quickly to protect the safety of all persons within the healthcare environment. The emergence of global pandemics and other large-scale emergencies have repeatedly highlighted an urgent need for healthcare facilities to maintain medical surge preparedness and surge capacity around the world. A medical surge occurs when the needs of clinical and/or patient volumes exceed the facility’s service limits. Surge capacity can be comprehensively defined as “the ability to obtain adequate staff, supplies and equipment, structures and systems to provide sufficient care to meet the immediate needs of an influx of patients following... Inadequate staffing due to shortages or high turnover can lead to unmanageable patient volume, delays in care, or staff burnout.

These factors promote serious barriers to patient safety, positive outcomes, efficiency, and healthcare worker satisfaction. Difficulties with educating staff and promoting the message “infection prevention is everyone’s responsibility” in the midst of competing priorities have been noted across healthcare facilities. Received 2021 May 19; Accepted 2021 Nov 29; Collection date 2021. Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to... The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from...

To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. Healthcare associated infections (HAIs) are the most frequent adverse outcome in healthcare delivery worldwide. In conflict-affected settings HAIs, in particular surgical site infections, are prevalent. Effective infection prevention and control (IPC) is crucial to ending avoidable HAIs and an integral part of safe, effective, high quality health service delivery. However, armed conflict and widespread violence can negatively affect the quality of health care through workforce shortages, supply chain disruptions and attacks on health facilities and staff.

To improve IPC in these settings it is necessary to understand the specific barriers and facilitators experienced locally. In January and February of 2020, we conducted semi-structured interviews with hospital staff working for the International Committee of the Red Cross across eight conflict-affected countries (Central African Republic, South Sudan, Democratic Republic of... We explored barriers and facilitators to IPC, as well as the direct impact of conflict on the hospital and its’ IPC programme. Data was analysed thematically. We found that inadequate hospital infrastructure, resource and workforce shortages, education of staff, inadequate in-service IPC training and supervision and large visitor numbers are barriers to IPC in hospitals in this study, similar to... High patient numbers, supply chain disruptions, high infection rates and attacks on healthcare infrastructures, all as a direct result of conflict, exacerbated existing challenges and imposed an additional burden on hospitals and their IPC...

We also found examples of local strategies for improving IPC in the face of limited resources, including departmental IPC champions and illustrated guidelines for in-service training. The dangers of blood- and fluid-borne illness don’t end at the hospital doors. When lifesaving measures are at an end, our colleagues in the death... Like solving a Rubik’s Cube or finishing a 10,000-piece puzzle, hospital PPE inventory management takes a special kind of brain. You’ve got to track suppliers,... In any hospital, even the smallest details can have massive impacts.

The disposable medical supplies you choose for your staff and patients are your first... Emerging pathogens and antimicrobial resistance demanded constant updates to infection prevention protocols and stewardship practices. Staffing, reporting, and budget pressures strained healthcare facilities, creating gaps in compliance, surveillance, and readiness. Practical training and expert guidance can help facilities strengthen accountability, improve daily practices, and sustain a culture of safety. Infection prevention has remained a critical focus for healthcare facilities, but 2025 highlighted just how difficult it can be to keep pace with emerging threats, regulatory expectations, and resource constraints. As facilities reflect on the past year, several key challenges stand out.

Understanding these risks and learning from them will help organizations position themselves for stronger outcomes in the year ahead. The challenge: In 2025, healthcare facilities faced an increasingly complex microbial landscape. Beyond familiar multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs), high-concern variants of common pathogens demanded rapid adjustments in infection control protocols. Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) forced facilities to reassess disinfection strategies, sterilization procedures, and prescribing practices, often in real time as new CDC and WHO recommendations were issued. The pace of change meant that protocols could become outdated quickly if not continuously reviewed. Infection prevention and control (IPC) is a practical, evidence-based approach preventing patients and health workers from being harmed by avoidable infections.

Effective IPC requires constant action at all levels of the health system, including policymakers, facility managers, health workers and those who access health services. IPC is unique in the field of patient safety and quality of care, as it is universally relevant to every health worker and patient, at every health care interaction. Defective IPC causes harm and can kill. Without effective IPC it is impossible to achieve quality health care delivery. Infection prevention and control effects all aspects of health care, including hand hygiene, surgical site infections, injection safety, antimicrobial resistance and how hospitals operate during and outside of emergencies. Programmes to support IPC are particularly important in low- and middle-income countries, where health care delivery and medical hygiene standards may be negatively affected by secondary infections.

Much of the work done on infection prevention and control (IPC) is hidden, as by its nature it prevents issues rather than treating them after the fact. However, health care-associated infections (HAIs) are an ongoing problem that no health authority can afford to ignore. To help in this fight, WHO has created a number of programmes and campaigns that set standards for evidence-based recommendations and operating procedures and promote behaviours to limit avoidable infections. The first WHO Global Patient Challenge laid the foundations for the IPC Global Unit, which works to support country capacity-building for IPC action. Through this programme, WHO provides technical assistance for developing local IPC policies and guidelines, performs in-country assessments, convenes meetings focused on guideline development and provides ongoing support for health care providers. WHO also makes a global annual call to action for health workers though the SAVE LIVES: Clean Your Hands campaign held each May.

This campaign seeks to educate health workers and patients on the importance of effective hand washing, the need for which has become more acute with the COVID-19 pandemic. Corresponding author: Salma Abbas; Email: salmaabbas@skm.org.pk Received 2024 Jan 3; Revised 2024 Feb 7; Accepted 2024 Feb 10; Collection date 2024. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution and reproduction, provided the original article is properly cited. The burden of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) and antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is disproportionately high in low and middle-income countries. Barriers to implementing effective antimicrobial stewardship and infection prevention programs include the lack of a structural framework, consensus guidelines, educational opportunities, trained personnel, funding, and access to resources such as manpower, information technology, and...

Socioeconomic instability with supply chain interruptions, poor skilled staff retention, absence of mandates, and inadequate support to enforce existing policies further aggravates the situation. Failure to implement measures to tackle AMR and HAIs effectively will result in repercussions globally. Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) such as catheter-related bloodstream infections (CRBSIs), catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs), ventilator-associated pneumonias (VAPs), and surgical site infections represent major healthcare challenges globally, with the burden being... 1–3 These lead to prolonged hospital lengths of stay (LOS), adversely impact patient outcomes, and inflate healthcare bills. 3 Inappropriate use of antibiotics leads to adverse events associated with antibiotics, higher healthcare costs, emergence of multidrug-resistant organisms, and infections such as Clostridioides difficile. 4,5 Programs designed to target infection prevention and control (IPC) and antimicrobial stewardship (AS) are inter-dependent and share several similarities including process and outcome metrics and resources.

6 Incorporation of these programs at healthcare facilities can reduce HAIs, help combat AMR, and improve health outcomes. 6 Core Infection Prevention and Control Practices for Healthcare Adherence to infection prevention and control practices is essential to providing safe and high quality patient care across all settings where healthcare is delivered This document concisely describes a core set of infection prevention and control practices that are required in all healthcare settings, regardless of the type of healthcare provided. The practices were selected from among existing CDC recommendations and are the subset that represent fundamental standards of care that are not expected to change based on emerging evidence or to be regularly altered...

The practices outlined in this document are intended to serve as a standard reference and reduce the need to repeatedly evaluate practices that are considered basic and accepted as standards of medical care. Readers should consult the full texts of CDC healthcare infection control guidelines for background, rationale, and related infection prevention recommendations for more comprehensive information. The core practices in this document should be implemented in all settings where healthcare is delivered. These venues include both inpatient settings (e.g., acute, long-term care) and outpatient settings (e.g., clinics, urgent care, ambulatory surgical centers, imaging centers, dialysis centers, physical therapy and rehabilitation centers, alternative medicine clinics). In addition, these practices apply to healthcare delivered in settings other than traditional healthcare facilities, such as homes, assisted living communities, pharmacies, and health fairs. Healthcare personnel (HCP) referred to in this document include all paid and unpaid persons serving in healthcare settings who have the potential for direct or indirect exposure to patients or infectious materials, including body...

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