Exploring the Relationship Between Nursing Specialty Certification and Surgical Site Infections

Abstract

Future theory-based research should examine the association of nursing specialty certification with patient outcomes and investigate the effect of Magnet status on SSI.

Hospital-Acquired Conditions Reduction Program, Patient Safety, and Magnet Designation in the United States

“…60 A previous study found that the odds for SSI decline by 0.3% for each 1-minute decline in surgical procedure time. 49 In addition, after taking into account the significant impact of patient-related factors and surgical procedure time, the authors found that the odds of SSI were reduced by 40% at Magnet hospitals. This draws a possibility that the real impact of the performance of nursing staff at Magnet hospitals on HAI is masked under the influence of known and unknown factors associated with each outcome.…”

“…30,31 Furthermore, the political and financial impact of the CMS's reimbursement penalty for hospitals that rank among the lowest performing quartile regarding HAC has a large influence on hospitals' efforts and the public's perception concerning patient safety. Although previous studies have sought to determine associations between Magnet recognition status and individual PSIs, 29,48,49 this is the first study to use a comprehensive assessment of critical PSIs such as those measured in CMS's HACRP 2018. 50 We found that Magnet hospitals had significantly better Domain 1 (recalibrated PSI-90 composite) scores as compared with non-Magnet hospitals.…”

“…Understanding the complex relationship of each subcomponent of Domain 2 scores with Magnet designation requires an exam of 49,57 These factors may influence the ability of nurses to practice to the full extent of their expertise and education, which may further influence patient outcomes. As such, our findings indicating (a) no difference between Magnet and non-Magnet hospitals and (b) worse outcomes associated with SSI and CAUTI measures suggest that some of these factors may impede or inhibit nursing structures, which are beneficial in other areas.…”

The role of community‐level characteristics in comparing United States hospital performance by magnet designation: A propensity score matched study

“…For example, previous research has indicated that magnet‐designated facilities score worse on surgical site infections, a less nurse‐sensitive quality measure (Hamadi et al, 2021). Additionally, others have proposed that differences in safety outcomes are associated with components that do not solely reside within nurses' responsibility, including job design, work segmentation, safety climate and safety culture (Bergquist‐Beringer et al, 2018; Ma & Park, 2015). Further research is necessary to understand better the unanticipated link between the incidence of hospital‐acquired infections and magnet designation hospitals to untangle the impact of community‐level characteristics.…”

Strategies to Increase Nursing Certification

“…It is evident from the literature that certified nurses initiate interventions early, monitor patients effectively, communicate efficiently with interdisciplinary teams, and improve patient outcomes by reducing surgical site infections (Bergquist-Beringer et al, 2018), surgical complications (Hickey et al, 2018), and falls (Coto et al, 2020). In acute care hospitals, wound care specialty certified nurses improved assessment of pressure injury risk, implementation of prevention interventions, and lowered HAPI (hospital-acquired pressure injury) rates, especially Stage 3 and Stage 4 HAPI occurrences, by about 50% (Boyle et al, 2017).…”