A groundbreaking infectious disease detection platform developed by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh, in collaboration with UPMC infection preventionists, has demonstrated significant success in reducing hospital-acquired infections. The system, called the Enhanced Detection System for Healthcare-Associated Transmission (EDS-HAT), leverages affordable genomic sequencing to flag genetically similar infections in patients, enabling faster containment of outbreaks.
Published in Clinical Infectious Diseases, the two-year trial (Nov. 2021–Oct. 2023) at UPMC Presbyterian Hospital showed that EDS-HAT prevented 62 infections and five deaths, saving nearly $700,000 in treatment costs, with a 3.2-fold return on investment.
EDS-HAT improves upon traditional infection control by identifying transmission patterns invisible to standard protocols. It enables hospitals to distinguish between coincidental infections and true outbreaks, preventing unnecessary interventions and enhancing patient safety.
The authors advocate for nationwide adoption of EDS-HAT, suggesting it could form the basis for a national early outbreak detection network akin to CDC’s PulseNet. This could have prevented past incidents, such as the 2023 eye drop-related bacterial outbreak.
“This isn’t theoretical – this happened in a real hospital with real patients,” said lead author Dr. Alexander Sundermann. Co-author Dr. Graham Snyder praised the project as a model for academic-clinical partnerships, while senior author Dr. Lee Harrison called its national implementation a “no-brainer.”
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