VIPTA is a statewide infection prevention and control education collaborative, led by the Virginia Healthcare-Associated Infections Advisory Group. Through partnership, VIPTA curates IPC resources for Virginia’s healthcare, congregate care, and public health settings.
The Infection Prevention Educator Roadshow Is Back This Summer
The Infection Prevention Educator Roadshow is hosted by the VDH HAI & AR Program and will be coming to a location near you in summer 2024.
More About This Resource
- This free training is focused on building your skills to educate healthcare workers on infection prevention and will be a hands-on learning day.
- Participants may come from all practice settings. Last year, participants came from acute care, long-term care, EMS, health department, behavioral health, congregate settings, public health, and more. All are welcome.
- This will be an all-new training; previous attendance not required. If you came to Roadshow 2023, there will be all new lessons this year, so please join us again!
- Register online – seats are filling up!
For questions about this training resource, contact ginger.vanhoozer@vdh.virginia.gov
Target Audience: Foundational, Intermediate, and Advanced IPC levels
Taking Antimicrobial Stewardship Beyond Hospital Walls: Community Outreach for Smarter Antibiotic Use
In an innovative effort to extend antimicrobial stewardship beyond the hospital setting, Carilion Clinic’s Antimicrobial Stewardship (AMS) team launched a community outreach initiative aimed at educating families about appropriate antibiotic use. Patient expectations play a key role in outpatient antibiotic prescribing. Meaningful conversations between patients and providers around antibiotic necessity are needed.
Carilion aimed to deliver accessible messaging through visually engaging billboards across southwest Virginia, reinforcing public health messages such as “Antibiotics don’t work on viruses” and “Antibiotics aren’t always the answer when you are sick.” Complementary posters in clinic waiting rooms provided patients and families with quick education, addressing common misconceptions about antibiotics for viral infections and raising awareness about potential antibiotic harms.
To further support their youngest patients, the AMS team partnered with a large pediatric practice to distribute “fever care kits” to improve at-home temperature tracking and symptom relief. Each kit contained a thermometer, simple symptom relief items, and an educational bookmark on fever and infections. These tangible resources helped empower caregivers to manage mild illnesses confidently at home and understand when antibiotics and healthcare visits might be unnecessary.
Early feedback from clinicians has been overwhelmingly positive, many of whom reported that these initiatives facilitated more productive conversations with patients about antibiotics. By bringing stewardship principles directly into the community, this is one more way Carilion’s AMS team is helping to reduce antibiotic misuse, slow the development of resistance, and preserve antibiotics’ effectiveness for future generations.
