Oncology facilities can receive free educational visit from DOH

Oncology patients face heightened susceptibility to infections due to the immune-suppressing nature of cancer treatments. This vulnerability exposes them to a range of infections including respiratory, bloodstream, and urinary tract infections.

To ensure appropriate infection control practices are in place in oncology settings, DOH’s Infection Prevention team is providing free Infection Control Assessments and Response (ICAR) educational visits for oncology facilities. The Infection Preventionist will provide real time feedback on infection control and prevention practices, answer facility questions, plus offer a summary report identifying best practices and areas of improvement, resources, and a certification of ICAR participation window cling. The ICAR can be an on-site visit or a televisit.

We’re asking our partners to help get the word out to facilities and various communities about our non-regulatory, free ICAR educational visits. Our goal is to provide additional infection control support to oncology facilities in Washington state to help reduce the risk of infections to this vulnerable patient population. We encourage you to share the flyer (PDF), which has more information on the ICAR visits, the importance of participating, and more.  

For questions about the project, email the Healthcare-Associated Infections and Antimicrobial Resistance team at HAI-FieldTEam@doh.wa.gov.