AIIMS receives CAHO-ACE Award for patient safety

Bhubaneswar: The AIIMS here has been conferred prestigious CAHO-ACE award.

The 'state-of-the-art' Central Sterile Services Department (CSSD) of AIIMS received the second prize under the Government Health Care Organisation category in the Consortium of Accredited Health Care Organisations Awareness Compliances and Excellence (CAHO-ACE) programme for 2021.

At a special programme held at Kochi (Kerala) AIIMS Medical Superintendent Dr Sachidananda Mohanty and AIIMS CSSD faculty in-charge Dr Ashok Kumar Jena received the award.

For the first time, AIIMS has been accorded national recognition after a strict process. The ACE award is related to improved compliance/ adherence in reprocessing reusable items for ensuring better patient safety.

Notably, this award is given to only two health care institutes nationally after adhering to patient safety processes. AIIMS director Prof Mukesh Tripathi congratulated the unit for the special award. The institute has always been following best practices for better patient safety, he added.

The modern sterilisation unit was dedicated to the hospital services on March 25, 2019. It is considered the backbone of sterile practices at AIIMS. The unit ensures safe reprocessing of various surgical and medical instruments, lines, and single-use items for patient care through efficient, effective and reliable systems.

The CSSD carries out all procedures in decontamination, cleaning, assembly, packaging, sterilisation and storage of sterile products. It caters to all types of sterile items to major OTs, ICUs, minor OTs, IPDs, OPDs.