A quality improvement project to reduce intravenous catheter related infections in the neonatology unit of Kibogora hospital in Rwanda

In developing countries, intravenous (IV) catheter related infections (CRI) rate is generally high. Neonates are more susceptible to develop CRI. We examined the impact of a quality improvement project on IV CRI rates in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) of a district hospital in Rwanda. A pre- and post-intervention study was conducted from 2014 to 2016 to evaluate the IV CRI rate and nurses’ IV management technique. A written test was administered to evaluate their knowledge on the matter. The intervention had three components: First implementing an IV management policy. Secondly, training staff on the policy and finally, managers provided support and supervision during the change. We measured five indicators: (1) the IV CRI rate; (2) the percentage of nurses who tested 80% on IV management knowledge; (3) the percentage of IV devices changed following the World Health Organization (WHO) guideline; (4) IV management technique; and (5) the hospital length of stay (LOS). The IV CRI rate reduced from 32.1% to 14.5% (p < .001). The hospital LOS reduced from 15.31 to 7.43 days (p < .001). The compliance of changing IV following WHO guideline increased from 0% to 99% (p < .001); proper IV management technique use increased from 43% to 96% (p < .001); the mean rank of staff on IV management knowledge score significantly increased from 3.5 to 9.5 (p = .004). This project demonstrates that a quality improvement project can help address the IV CRI at very low cost in a resource-challenged setting.