Improving and sustaining a reduction in iatrogenic pneumothorax through a multifaceted quality-improvement approach

Background: The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality has adopted iatrogenic pneumothorax (IAP) as a Patient Safety Indicator. In 2006, in response to a low performance ranking for IAP rate from the University Healthsystem Consortium (UHC), the authors established a multidisciplinary team to reduce our institution's IAP rate. Root-cause analysis found that subclavian insertion of central venous catheterization (CVC) was the most common procedure associated with IAP OBJECTIVE: Our short-term goal was a 50% reduction of both CVC-associated and all-cause IAP rates within 18 months, with long-term goals of sustained reduction.

Design: Observational study.

Setting: Academic tertiary care hospital.

Patients: Consecutive inpatients from 2006 to 2014.

Intervention: Our multifaceted intervention included: (1) clinical and documentation standards based on evidence, (2) cognitive aids, (3) simulation training, (4) purchase and deployment of ultrasound equipment, and (5) feedback to clinical services.

Measurements: CVC-associated IAP, all-cause IAP rate.

Results: We achieved both a short-term (years 2006 to 2008) and long-term (years 2006 to 2008-2014) reduction in our CVC-associated and all-cause IAP rates. Our short-term reduction in our CVC-associated IAP was 53% (P = 0.088), and our long-term reduction was 85% (P < 0.0001). Our short-term reduction in the all-cause IAP rate was 26% (P < 0.0001), and our long-term reduction was 61% (P < 0.0001).

Conclusions: A multidisciplinary team, focused on evidence, patient safety, and standardization, can use a set of multifaceted interventions to sustainably improve patient outcomes for several years after implementation. Our hospital was in the highest performance UHC quartile for all-cause IAP in 2012 to 2014.