Mr Zach Woodrow1
1St Vincent's Private Hospital Melbourne, , Australia
Biography:
Originally hailing from the United Kingdom, Zach is a Registered Nurse with extensive leadership experience in Emergency, Urgent Care, and Surgical Nursing. For the past four years Zach has worked as an Infection Prevention Nurse at St Vincent's Private Hospital Melbourne and has an avid passion for invasive device management.
Abstract:
It is well published that Catheter-Associated Urinary Tract Infections (CAUTIs) are one of the most common types of hospital acquired infections (HAIs), leading to an increased risk of secondary blood stream infection, morbidity, and mortality. Despite this, many CAUTIs are preventable.
The St Vincent’s Private Hospital Melbourne Infection Prevention Team recognised a slowly increasing trend in hospital-acquired CAUTIs and commenced a CAUTI reduction project across four hospitals in February 2024, which took approximately eighteen months to fully roll out. This project utilised an approach using the self-coined acronym “I-PEED” which is a model that focuses on improving indwelling urinary catheter (IDC) insertion and care, providing education to patients, promoting early removal of IDCs, and improving clinical documentation. Part of this project included the introduction of an IDC insertion sticker which allowed for quick, comprehensive IDC insertion documentation to occur. It also included the delivery of short, fifteen-minute, education sessions to clinical staff which promoted the use of the I-PEED model.
Upon completion of the project in July 2025 there was a considerable reduction in hospital acquired CAUTIs, with a 66.6% reduction recorded in July – December 2025 compared to the same six-month period the year before. In addition to this, there was overwhelming feedback from healthcare workers that the I-PEED model improved their clinical practice and patient experience.
Although the project continues, the initial findings show that the I-PEED model has had a significant impact on the reduction of hospital acquired CAUTIs.