Bar Chart

A bar chart is a type of report that uses vertical, rectangular bars with lengths proportional to the values that they represent.

Bar charts are used for plotting discrete data, such as quantity of surveillance files for a particular location, organism or follow-up action. The information can be broken into groupings of one, two or three levels.

In this example, the total number of files is shown (y-axis) for the top four organisms (x-axis) with the rest of the organisms making up the “Other” bar.

Stacked Bar Chart

A stacked bar chart is a variation of the bar chart. It allows you to show the subgrouped element in a single bar, differentiated by color. In this chart example, the surgeon code is on the x-axis and the number of infections in each operating room is on the y-axis.

Control Chart

A line chart that contains additional statistical analysis features: upper control limit, lower control limit and EWMAExponentially Weighted Moving Average. A moving average chart that flattens the peaks and troughs to highlight the underlying trend of what is being reported. (Exponentially Weighted Moving Average) lines.

If the EWMA goes outside the control limits, the process is “out of control.” Some part of the system has changed and has had a significant effect on what is being observed. The statistics determine that the change is highly unlikely to be purely by chance alone.

The parameters for the control chart can be adjusted: λ is the weighting factor for the EWMA and K is the number of standard deviations used for the control limits.

This example shows a control chart of isolates of MRSA by month, and also includes a benchmark.

Cusum

A CUSUM (short for cumulative summation) is a comparison between the observed values within each reporting period and the average over the whole period of the report.

Interpreting CUSUM charts focuses on the direction and steepness of the lines. Trending upwards indicates above average observations; downwards indicates below average.

This example shows that community and healthcare acquisition sources were above average from January 2010 to June 2010.

Histogram

A histogram consists of tabular frequencies, shown as adjacent rectangles, over discrete time intervals. It is commonly called an epidemic curve or epi curve and is used to display cases in an epidemic or outbreak. Time is plotted on the X axis and incident cases on the Y axis. The distribution of cases over time can be used to propose hypotheses on the nature of the disease and its mode of transmission (e.g., point source, continuous source, intermittent, etc). Epi curves may be useful for determining the incubation period of the hypothesizeddisease.

Line Listing

The line listing report allows you to select which fields from the selected ContextThe type of records that will be examined for reporting purposes, such as surveillance files, surgical procedures, central line insertions, etc. The values contained in other reporting drop-down lists change based upon the selected Context. should display in a table. This report type is significantly different from the other reports. The Show section is replaced by the Fields section (Selecting Fields) and the Denominator and Benchmark section are hidden.

In this example, the patients name, floor and date the surveillance file was created is displayed in a table.

Pareto Chart

A Pareto report highlights the proportions of the observations in a report and is an alternative to a pie chart. It places the most frequent observation first and the rest of the observations in order of decreasing frequency. The line on the chart indicates the accumulated percentage of the observations.

Using the chart shown here, one can see that just over 70% of all infections are of the first four primary infection types reported.

Pareto charts can assist Infection teams or stewardship teams in selecting high problem events for improvement.

Pie Chart

A pie chart is a circular graph divided into sectors, illustrating proportion. Pie charts can be an effective way of displaying information if the intent is to compare the size of a slice with the whole pie, rather than comparing the slices among them.

In this example, each slice is an infection type. Their relative size shows the incident types that make up the portion of surveillance files reported.

Rate Table

A rate table shows the numerical data in the form of a table. Click any of the numbers in the table to show the individual data items that make up the numbers.

From the Returned Results dialog, click the View or File link to view the surveillance file.

Tip: Right-click the File link and choose Open in New Tab or Window to view the file without navigating away from the report.

Running Total

A running total chart shows the accumulated count of what is being reported as a line.

The running total chart is particularly useful for financial reports that can show the accumulation over time of estimated money spent in financial burden of healthcare acquired infections.