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AANA Journal Course 6Update for Nurse Anesthetists Surgical Site Infection and Prevention Guidelines:A Primer for Certified Registered Nurse AnesthetistsCDR Valerie Diaz, CRNA, DNP, USNJohanna Newman, CRNA, DNAPEach year 500,000 surgical site infections occur in the US. Surgical site infections are the second most common healthcare-associated infections resulting in readmissions, prolonged hospital stays, higher medi-cal costs, and increased morbidity and mortality. Sur-gical site infections are preventable in most cases by following evidence-based guidelines for hand hygiene, administration of prophylactic antibiotics, and periop-erative patient temperature management. As attention to issues of healthcare quality heightens, the demandsfor positive surgical patient outcomes are intensify-ing. The Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist can provide transparent high-quality care by implementing evidence-based guidelines for timely and appropriate antibiotic use, maintenance of normothermia, and hand washing.Keywords: Antibiotic prophylaxis, hand washing, hypothermia, Surgical Care Improvement Project, surgical site infection.ObjectivesAt the completion of this course, the reader should be able to:1. Define the diagnostic criteria, risk factors, and causes of surgical site infection.2. Identify the Surgical Care Improvement Project per-formance measures that target prevention of postop-erative infection.3. Illustrate the appropriate antibiotic timing and dosing for general, gynecologic, orthopedic, and colorectal surgeries.4. Describe intraoperative thermoregulation and its impact on surgical site infection.5. Illustrate appropriate hand hygiene procedures as recommended by the World Health Organization.IntroductionThe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that 500,000 surgical site infections (SSIs) occur an-nually and account for 3% of surgical mortality, prolonged lengths of hospital stay, and increased medical costs.