Pad weighing for reduction of indwelling urinary use and catheter-associated urinary tract infection: a quality improvement project.

Catheter-associated urinary tract infections pose a significant risk to hospitalized patients. Measuring accurate urinary output is a common reason for indwelling catheterizations in acutely ill patients. The risk of catheter-associated infections may be eliminated while maintaining ability to measure urinary output of incontinent patients through the use of a highly absorbent pad and weighing postincontinence. The dry pad weight is subtracted from the wet pad weight and the resulting difference (expressed in grams) equals the volume of urine leaked into the pad in milliliters. We found that using this system of improved measurement of urine output when compared to documenting the number of incontinent episodes while allowing removal of indwelling urethral catheters as soon as possible.