The Pressure Ulcers to Zero (PUTZ) collaborative is sponsored by the Health Service Executive (HSE) National Quality Improvement Team (NQI Team).
A collaborative is a short-term (6- to 15-month) learning system that brings together a number of teams from healthcare settings to seek improvement in a focused topic area. (The Breakthrough Series: IHI’s Collaborative Model for Achieving Breakthrough Improvement. IHI Innovation Series white paper. Boston: Institute for Healthcare Improvement; 2003)
The primary aim of PUTZ is to reduce the number of avoidable pressure ulcers across participating teams by 50% within the time frame of the collaborative and to increase the capacity and capability of frontline clinical teams to improve the care they deliver.
The PUTZ collaborative places an intentional focus on pressure ulcer prevention as pressure ulcers are:
- An increasing problem that affect thousands of people unnecessarily every year
- Painful, debilitating and can be life threatening
The cost of treating a pressure ulcer can vary but it has been estimated that it costs €119,000 to successfully treat one patient with a grade 4 pressure ulcer. Based on this figure, it is estimated that it could cost €250 million per annum to manage pressure ulcers across all care settings in Ireland (Gethin et al.2005)
Click below for more information about:
PUTZ Background
Collaborative Learning Sessions
Resources
