Effective July 1, 2025, a fully revised Infection Prevention and Control (IC) chapter, including new and revised requirements will apply to all Joint Commission-accredited behavioral health care and human services organizations and office-based surgery practices. Effective IC practices are needed to ensure patient safety in these settings, where infection risks may arise from invasive procedures, preexisting infections, close physical proximity in residential and group settings, and other situations.
The goal of the IC chapter rewrite is to help organizations solidify a strong framework for their IC activities and remove requirements that do not add value to accreditation surveys. The changes are consistent with The Joint Commission’s ongoing initiative to simplify its requirements and provide more meaningful evaluations of healthcare organizations. The IC chapter rewrite continues the project that includes new and revised requirements that replaced current IC requirements.
The Joint Commission also created a new IC Assessment Tool that details the IC practices, structures, and documentation needed to meet the IC requirements. The tool includes components that may be evaluated during survey and standard/element of performance (EP) locations for scoring. The tool was developed using the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Core IC Practices and relevant regulations. The new tool is available on Joint Commission-accredited organizations’ Joint Commission Connect® extranet; it also will be added to the Behavioral Health Care and Human Services and Office-Based Surgery Survey Activity Guides in spring 2025.
For more information, please contact The Joint Commission’s Global Accreditation and Certification Product Development.
See the revised IC chapter Prepublication Standards (includes a program-specific guide showing where concepts from the old EPs have moved in the new EPs, as well as applicability information for behavioral health care and human services organizations)
The latest Master Your Healthcare Career Podcast episode features Dr. Jonathan B. Perlin, president and chief executive officer, The Joint Commission and Joint Commission International. Dr. Anthony Stanowski, president & CEO of the Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Management Education (CAHME), interviews Dr. Perlin, taking us through his career as a physician and researcher. Dr. Perlin shares invaluable insights for early career professionals about navigating a field that demands a balance of health equity, environmental sustainability and continuous learning.
The Joint Commission’s Sentinel Event Alert, “Environmental disasters: Preparing to safely evacuate or shelter in place,” which published in November 2024, is the topic of a recent article in Chief Healthcare Executive®. In the article, The Joint Commission’s Elizabeth Mort, MD, MPH, vice president and chief medical officer, and Kevin Zacharyasz, director of Healthcare Sustainability, talk about preparing for disasters and the ways hospital leaders must think differently.
Are you passionate about healthcare quality and safety improvement? The National Association for Healthcare Quality (NAHQ) would like you to share your innovative ideas, groundbreaking research and best practices in healthcare quality and safety improvement at NAHQ next, taking place Sept. 8-10, 2025.
The 2025 Joint Commission Publications Catalog is now available. The catalog includes:
- Accreditation and certification standards manuals. New this year are manuals for the Rural Health Clinics and Telehealth accreditation programs as well as new editions for the Health Care Equity and Sustainable Healthcare Certification programs.
- Resources on specialized quality and patient safety topics, such as emergency management, environment of care, infection prevention and control, life safety, and risk assessment.
- Periodicals, books, e-books, readiness resources, practical checklists and tools.
- Posters and badge buddies for the 2025 National Patient Safety Goals for hospitals.
- And more!