Pressure ulcers cause considerable harm to patients, slowing recovery, causing pain and can lead to the development of serious infections. Reducing the occurrence of pressure ulcers stops suffering from this potentially dangerous condition and saves hospitals millions of dollars that would otherwise be spent on treating this injury. Successful reduction of pressure ulcers involves identifying at risk patients and implementing prevention strategies for those patients. Most pressure ulcers can be prevented.

Participating hospitals will reduce their 2007 HAPU rate by a minimum of 50% (all units combined). . Individual improvement goals will be determined by each facility and may vary.

Data will be obtained from CHART for hospitals participating in CHART.

Baseline:
2007 mean for hospitals that participate in CHART 4.5%, median 3%, 25th percentile 2%