What are our members doing to encourage and support the professionals in Infection Prevention? Paula Conrad, MSN, RN, CNL, CIC, Manager, Infection Prevention and Control at Boston Children's Hospital shared what their organization is doing to help promote and grow the department.

As we know, the pandemic has resulted in dramatic changes to healthcare systems, and it continues to exhaust our healthcare resources.

Boston Children's Hospital has over 40 clinical departments, including 258 specialized programs at several locations throughout the Boston area. Prior to the pandemic, the department had a director and four infection preventionists to cover the entire enterprise. The pandemic really highlighted the need for more infection prevention oversight in many areas. This prompted the department to do a comprehensive needs assessment. This allowed them to describe the resources required for all inpatient, ambulatory, and satellite locations. The organization has supported the findings, and in a little over two years, they have just hired their twelfth infection preventionist!

With growth comes change, so the department has implemented a new organizational structure for infection prevention. There is now a senior director, a manager, two lead infection preventionists, and staff IPs.

Recently, they redesigned the orientation process for newly hired IP's, to make it more structured. They now have an 8-week program; each week has a theme, and readings from the APIC text and other related resources are assigned for the IP to review. They also work with another IP during that week focusing on that theme. Depending on the needs of the infection preventionist, the orientation could be extended to allow them more opportunity to learn.

They have also implemented a clinical ladder program within the department, which has three levels. There are specific requirements for each level. They followed the APIC competency model to build the levels to help staff achieve experience and expand their knowledge base as they continue in their career. The organization supports the professional development of the infection preventionist as they continue to expand their healthcare services across the area.

One other unique feature of the program is the role of the Infection Prevention Nurse. This is an RN that is working in a certain department, like critical care. They are given dedicated hours per week to do infection control activities within their unit and then collaborate with the IP that is assigned to that unit with their findings. Not all units have this role, but it has proven to help keep staff informed and to maintain good working relationships with the departments.

It is sometimes difficult to describe exactly what an infection preventionist does in their role. With all the challenges that healthcare organizations are facing right now, Boston Children's has demonstrated that they are committed to having a strong group of Infection Preventionists at their organization.