New York-based inpatient facilities working with IPRO on reducing hospital-acquired infections are showing dramatic improvements in performance. Under IPRO’s three-year Medicare QIO contract which concludes this July, participating hospitals are addressing four major categories of infection: central line-associated blood stream infections (CLABSIs), catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs), Clostridium Difficile infections (CDIs), and surgical site infections (SSIs). IPRO convenes face-to-face regional learning and action network (LAN) meetings as well as webinars and workshops with expert speakers to focus attention on such issues as hand hygiene surveillance and on root-cause analysis. IPRO helps hospital staffs implement structured, evidence-based methods for improving care processes. So far, hospitals working with IPRO exceeded the CLABSI reduction goal of 50%, achieving a reduction of 62%. Participating hospitals also met or exceeded urinary catheter utilization goals for the CAUTI project. Hospitals exceeded the SSI goal of having more than 50% of participating hospitals enrolled in explicit quality improvement programs. And while re-measurement for the CDI project is still underway, hospitals working with IPRO have already surpassed the 10% CDI improvement goal, with a 21.5% improvement rate. According to IPRO Vice President Tom Hartman: “These improvements demonstrate the importance of working collaboratively, and of making a concerted effort to reduce infection by using evidence-based practices.”