The role and efficacy of the infection control nurse in U.S. hospitals.

Although infection control nurses have played a major role in hospital infection control programs for more than a decade, there was little published scientific evidence with which to evaluate whether having an infection control nurse, or any other component of an infection control program, would actually reduce a hospital's nosocomial infection rate. To develop such evaluative evidence, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) carried out several nationwide studies in random samples of U.S. hospitals. Data from the studies show that having an infection control nurse for every 250 occupied hospital beds is an important component in reducing nosocomial urinary tract infections, bacteremia, and postoperative pneumonia.