Martin chats to Phil in Melbourne following a recent presentation. Yes, two old farts reminiscing about the days of wearing out the boot leather collecting surveillance data talk with envy about the potential of HAI surveillance in the era of the electronic medical record, automation and artificial intelligence.

Phil refers to data in these two publications:

• Designing Surveillance of Healthcare-Associated Infections in the Era of Automation and Reporting Mandates
• The prevalence of healthcare associated infections among adult inpatients at nineteen large Australian acute-care public hospitals: a point prevalence survey