The impact of autocancellation of uncollected specimens after 24 hours on reported healthcare-associated infections: A quality improvement intervention.

Objective: To assess the impact of a 24-hour autocancellation of uncollected samples in reducing reported healthcare-associated infections (HAIs).

Design: Quality-improvement, before-and-after implementation study.

Setting: The study was conducted in 17 hospitals in Pennsylvania.

Interventions: tests that are not collected within 24 hours are automatically canceled ("autocancel") through the electronic health record. The intervention took place at 2 facilities (intervention period November 2021-July 2022) and subsequently at 15 additional facilities (April 2022-July 2022). Quality measures included percentage of orders canceled, HAI rate, percent positivity of completed tests, and potential adverse outcomes of canceled or delayed testing.

Results: Of 6,101 orders, 1,090 (17.9%) were automatically canceled after not being collected for 24 hours during the intervention periods. The reported HAI rates per 10,000 patient days did not significantly change. These rates were 8.07 in the 6-month preintervention period and 8.77 in the intervention period for facilities A and B combined (incidence rate ratio [IRR], 1.09; 95% CI, 0.88-1.34; = .43), and were 5.23 HAIs per 10,000 patient days in the 6-month preintervention period and 5.33 in the intervention period for facilities C-Q combined (IRR, 1.02; 95% CI, 0.79-1.32; .87). From the preintervention to the intervention periods, the percent positivity rates of completed tests increased by 1.1% for facilities A and B and by 1.4% for facilities C-Q. No adverse outcomes were observed.

Conclusions: The 24-hour autocancellation of uncollected orders reduced testing but did not result in reported HAI reduction.