CDC Foundation and Cubist Work to Improve Patient Safety and Antimicrobial Stewardship in U.S. Hospitals

Antibiotics save lives, but poor prescribing practices are putting patients in U.S. hospitals at unnecessary risk for serious adverse events with no clinical benefit. Errors in prescribing decisions also contribute to antibiotic resistance, making these drugs less likely to work in the future. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that each year in the U.S. more than 2 million people are infected with antibiotic-resistant organisms, resulting in approximately 23,000 deaths annually. To better protect patients, the CDC Foundation received a nearly $1 million grant from Cubist to develop patient safety outcome measures and measurement tools for hospital-based programs dedicated to improving antibiotic use, commonly referred to as antibiotic stewardship programs (ASPs).

“CDC’s close collaboration with healthcare facilities and large health systems is essential to strengthening antibiotic stewardship programs and reducing antibiotic resistance. We are grateful to Cubist for their support of this vital program,” said Charles Stokes, president and CEO of the CDC Foundation.

The Cubist grant enables CDC and investigators from Duke University Medical Center and the Duke Antimicrobial Stewardship Outreach Network to help hospital ASPs routinely monitor the outcomes of their work (meaning better antibiotic prescribing practices) through the development of a data collection and analysis tool.

The primary goals for this two-year grant include:

  • Identifying standardized patient safety and quality of care outcomes measures that are meaningful and practical for hospital ASPs; and
  • Developing a data collection and outcomes assessment tool that can be implemented at a variety of acute care hospitals and for a variety of stewardship interventions. 

This project falls under the Safe Healthcare Initiative, a partnership program coordinated by CDC’s Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion and the CDC Foundation to eliminate healthcare-associated infections. To learn more about this initiative and how you can become a partner, contact Alison Thompson, associate vice president for advancement, athompson@cdcfoundation.org.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

About the CDC Foundation

The CDC Foundation advances the mission of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention through effective philanthropy and public-private partnerships that protect the health, safety and security of America and the world. Established by Congress more than two decades ago, the CDC Foundation is an independent, nonprofit organization that has launched nearly 900 programs and raised more than $662 million through partnerships with philanthropies, corporations, organizations and individuals. The CDC Foundation currently manages more than 300 CDC-led programs in the United States and in 85 countries.