Hello, and welcome to the presentation NHSN Enrollment Instructions for Long Term Care Facilities. This presentation will provide long term care facilities with instructions for NHSN enrollment. My name is Sarah Potter. I am a Quality Improvement Advisor for atom Alliance. During this presentation, I am going to provide instructions for enrolling your Long Term Care facility in NHSN. If you aren t familiar with NHSN, it stands for the National Healthcare Safety Network. NHSN is the CDC s Healthcare Associated Infection Tracking System. Entering infection data into NHSN will allow your facility to help establish a National baseline for Nursing Home C. Difficile rates, and subsequently identify goals to improve the quality of care and resident outcomes. NHSN is an internet application, so it can easily be accessed from any computer without needing to purchase any special software. It is only compatible with Internet Explorer versions 7 or above. It will not work properly with any other web browser, such as Firefox or Chrome. In order to utilize the NHSN website you will need to set up your internet browser to allow CDC sites to be accessed. To do this, open Internet Explorer, then in the top right corner you will see an icon that looks like a wrench. Select it, and it will open the Tools menu. From the tools menu, select Internet Options. When the Internet Options box opens, you will need to click on the Advanced tab on the far right. You will then see a list of settings with check boxes. Scroll down that list until you see Use TLS 1.0 and make sure the box next to it is checked. Then, make sure to click the Apply button to save the changes. Selecting this provides extra security for sites that exchange secure data over a network. The next step is to ensure that the CDC s websites are listed as trusted sites. Like the previous workflow, go to the Tools icon in the top right of your browser screen, and select Internet Options. When the box opens, click on the Security tab. Select the checkmark icon that says trusted sites. Then, below that you should see a button labeled sites on the right side. Selecting this button will allow you to add websites that you trust to open. In order to make a website a trusted site, you will need to type it in the top box and click the add button. The websites you need to add are listed here. CDC.gov and Verisign.com. You will need to add them one at a time. Then, once you click add, you should see the sites listed in the bottom box. Sometimes, your organization might not allow users to change these sites. If the top box is greyed out and you are unable to type inside it then you will need to contact your IT department and request that they add these sites to your trusted sites on Internet Explorer. The last step in preparing for NHSN enrollment is to change the SPAM Blocker settings in your email. This will allow NHSN to send emails to you successfully. In this presentation I m demonstrating how to
do this in Microsoft Outlook email. If you have a different email application the process might be a little different. To change your SPAM Blocker settings, open your Outlook email. On the Home tab, just to the left of the Delete icon, you will see a button that says junk and has a drop down arrow. Select it, then select junk email options. A separate box will open up. In that box, go to the safe senders tab. This is where you can add email addresses that you trust to ensure those messages come to your inbox successfully and don t go to the SPAM folder, or even in some cases, be blocked. To add an email address, click the Add button then type the address in the box and click ok. Do this for each of the emails listed here on the screen. Receiving emails from these addresses is a very important piece of the NHSN enrollment process. Now that you have prepared your internet browser and email settings, we can move on to the preparation needed for NHSN enrollment specifically. The enrollment process is broken down into 5 steps. Step 1 is training and preparation for enrollment The CDC provides a wonderful checklist to help walk you through the step by step process for NHSN Enrollment. You can download and save this checklist from the link provided here. It is recommended that the person who will be responsible for enrolling your facility print this checklist to utilize through the process. It even provides the time it should take for each step, which is very useful. This will help ensure you have the time to complete that step before you get started on it. The first step in the enrollment process is to complete the training component. The training slides are provided on the CDC s NHSN website at the link provided here. I m going to go through these steps in this presentation, however it is required for enrollment that your facility s NHSN users view the CDC s presentation as well. It s up to you how your facility completes this training. The user may watch the slides individually or you may decide to go through them together as a group. Either method is acceptable, and the slides are accessible anytime at the link on the BOTTOM of this slide. Another step in preparation is to print and fill out the Facility Contact Form. This form includes information about your facility that will be needed throughout the enrollment process. In the NHSN Components section, you will need to make sure and select the Long Term Care Facility component. When electronically filling out this information you can t stop and go back to fill it out later, it must be filled out in one sitting. So, it s very helpful to have all this information filled out on this paper form to reference during that step. You can find this form at the link on this slide. The same goes for the Annual Facility Survey form. This is information that will be needed while enrolling online. It will need to be updated annually in NHSN. It includes more specific information regarding the type of facility as well as the type of residents at your facility.
Just like the contact form, it is recommended that you print and fill this out on paper to assist you in the online enrollment process. After your NHSN users have completed the training, the next step is to request to enroll your facility. In order to participate in NHSN, the user must read and agree to abide by the rules of behavior. This is the first thing that will come up when you go online and begin the enrollment process. I ve also provided the direct link to the rules of behavior here on this slide. Once you ve read the rules, click the Agree button to begin the enrollment process. Once you have agreed to abide by the rules of behavior, you will then need to complete the registration form. Be sure to include name and email for the NHSN facility administrator and the facility CMS certification number (CCN). When you hear the term, NHSN facility administrator, keep in mind this is NOT necessarily the Nursing Home s Administrator. The NHSN facility administrator is the person who leads the NHSN enrollment and reporting for your facility. This will most likely be the person who will be entering the data into NHSN for your facility. Your facility should identify the person best suited for this role. Immediately after completing this registration form and clicking submit, the NHSN facility administrator will receive an email with the subject line Welcome to NHSN! We recommend that you create an email folder titled NHSN to help keep track of all the emails you will receive throughout the enrollment process. Step 3 is to register for SAMS the Secure Access Management System. SAMS gives authorized personnel secure access to non-public CDC applications. It provides healthcare facilities, and their partners such as state health departments, with secure and immediate access to NHSN. Once the NHSN registration steps are completed, you will receive an email from SAMS inviting you to register. In the email there will be instructions and a link. The link will take you to the SAMS rules of behavior as well as a registration form. You will need to complete all of that information. Once SAMS registration if filled out, you will then receive an email with instructions for verifying your identity. THIS EMAIL IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT. It includes an application. You must print this email and fill out the application section. When filling out this application, you must provide your home address. Do not put the facility s address. Your SAMS registration is specific to you as an individual. The home address that you enter on this form MUST match your identity proofing documents, such as your Photo ID. If your ID does not have an address on it, or the address is not current, a utility bill, pay stub, or voter registration card (you re your current address) may be used. To summarize, the address you enter on this application form MUST match the document you will provide to prove your identity. If it does not match, it will not be accepted.
Once completed, you will need to scan and upload this application, along with copies of your identity documents, to the SAMS website. The link to that site is listed here at the bottom of the steps on this slide. When your identity is confirmed and your request has been approved, you will receive two emails, a welcome to SAMS and a welcome to NHSN. Within 7 to 10 days after receiving these emails, you will receive a SAMS grid card at the home address you provided in your application. Your card will not be mailed to the facility where you work, it will be mailed to your home address. You will use this card when logging in to NHSN. Now that your requests for enrollment have been completed and you are registered for SAMS, you must submit your facility s forms electronically. These are the 2 forms we discussed earlier, the facility contact form and annual facility survey form. Make sure you have received your SAMS grid card before moving on to these steps. In order to enter these forms electronically, you must first login to SAMS. You will need the username and password that you created during enrollment, as well as your SAMS grid card. When you click login you will be prompted to enter values from your SAMS grid card. An example from this card on the screen would be to enter B 3, so you would enter the value 1. This is just an added security step when logging in to enter your facility s data in NHSN. To submit your facility s forms for enrollment, check the box next to NHSN Enrollment If you have not already printed and completed the forms on paper, you have another chance to do that here. Just click the link to Access and print enrollment forms, and choose the 2 listed under the Long Term Care Facility component. Once you have the printed forms completed and are ready to fill them out online, click the link enroll a facility. Remember, this is a step that must be completed in one sitting. You cannot save your work and complete it later. So, before you start, double check your paper forms and make sure they are complete. The first few pieces of information are about your facility type, which components you will be using in NHSN and the NHSN facility administrator s contact information. Select the facility type that best matches your facility, such as assisted living or skilled nursing facility. The required NHSN component you must choose in order to be able to enter infection data is the long term care facility component. Long term care facilities can also utilize the Healthcare Personnel Safety Component if they wish. An example of data tracked in that component is staff influenza vaccinations. When entering the NHSN facility administrator contact info, make sure to use the email address that was used to register for their SAMS access. In this section it is ok to use the facility s physical address.
The Long Term Care facility component requires a contact person to be entered. It s recommended that this person be the one who is most involved in the surveillance of infections at your facility. It can be the same person as the NHSN facility administrator, but doesn t necessarily have to be. An example might be that you have an Infection Prevention nurse that you d like to be the point of contact, however you also have a data entry person who would be the NHSN facility administrator. It s up to each specific facility to identify who would be best for these roles. Now that you ve completed the contact information for your facility it is time to complete the annual facility survey. Remember, you cannot partially complete a form, save and return to it. It must be completed in one sitting. If you have questions about how to fill out this form, there is an instruction guide provided by the CDC. The link is provided at the bottom of this slide as well. Once you have saved all the information for your facility contact form and the annual facility survey, you will have the opportunity to print the information before submitting. If all the required info is saved, you will see a green check mark. Also, the link to print will be out to the right side of the survey. Once you see the green check mark and print your survey, click the Save and Submit button! Don t forget, if you printed your survey, go back to this screen and click save and submit. You re almost there! Your facility is enrolled and there is only one more step to the process! The facility administrator will receive an email from NHSN with a link to a consent form. Make sure to follow up with NHSN if you do not receive this email. The helpdesk email is nhsn@cdc.gov. This helpdesk email can be utilized at any time you experience difficulties with any of the steps in the enrollment process. We have reached the last step in the enrollment process! Step 5 is to print, sign and submit the facility consent forms The facility administrator should have received an email with the subject NHSN facility enrollment submitted. The email should contain a link to access the consent forms. The forms will need to be signed by the NHSN Long Term Care contact person, as well as the highest level administrator at your facility. Once printed and signed, you will need to scan the forms and submit to the CDC. The contact information for where to send the forms is at the bottom of the form on page 3. Within 3 business days of the CDC receiving these forms, you will receive an email with the subject NHSN Enrollment Approved. Your enrollment process is then complete! Here is a list of the resources we discussed today. The CDCs website has many of these resources available to assist you with NHSN and the enrollment process. Here are a few we talked about today and that I thought would be especially useful.
Once again, my name is Sarah Potter. I am a Quality Improvement Advisor with atom Alliance. I work in the Nashville, TN office of Qsource. You can contact me directly for any NHSN enrollment questions. You may also reach out to your specific state contact listed on the next slide. Also remember you can contact the NHSN help desk directly at nhsn@cdc.gov I hope this presentation is beneficial for you while enrolling your facility to NHSN. Please let us know if you have any questions and thank you so much for listening!