WGU D221

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Apr 3, 2024

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Inadequate Hand Hygiene in the Healthcare Setting Andrew Buck Western Governors University D221: Organizational Systems and Healthcare Transformation Leslie Ferrygood December 2nd, 2023

Inadequate Hand Hygiene in the Healthcare Setting A1. Describe a Healthcare-Related Situation Prompting a Systems-Level Patient Safety Concern that has the Potential to Impact Multiple Patients. Inadequate hand hygiene by healthcare staff, workers, and visitors, in the healthcare setting can be detrimental to positive patient outcomes. Many patients in the healthcare setting are battling with one form of infection or another. Thus, their immune systems are likely to be vulnerable to opportunistic infection. Many patients are immunocompromised, and the result of inadequate hand hygiene can lead to the introduction of additional germs, bacteria or viruses. Hand hygiene is now regarded as one of the most important elements of infection control activities. In the wake of the growing burden of health care associated infections (HCAIs), the increasing severity of illness and complexity of treatment, superimposed by multi-drug resistant (MDR) pathogen infections, health care practitioners (HCPs) are reversing back to the basics of infection preventions by simple measures like adequate hand hygiene. (Purva Mathur, 2020). A2. Analyze Background Information about the Concern A2a. Data Inadequate hand hygiene has a significant impact on both patient safety and positive outcomes. As a result of inadequate hand hygiene patients are at an increased risk for developing a number of healthcare acquired infections. This includes but is not limited to, catheter associated urinary tract infections (CAUTI), central line associated bloodstream infections (CLABSI), hospital acquired pneumonia, c.diff, and surgical site infections. In 2014, the CDC published a multistate point prevalence survey of healthcare-associated infections involving 11,282 patients from 183 US hospitals. [12] According to this report, about 4% of hospitalized patients suffered from at least one of

the HAI. In absolute numbers, in 2011, an estimated 648,000 hospitalized patients suffered from 721,800 infections (Alberto F. Monegro; Vijayadershan Muppidi; Hariharan Regunath, 2023). A2b. National Safety Standard(s) Adequate hand hygiene is under The Joint Commission’s National Patient Safety Goal standard of infection prevention. By disregarding the task of adequate hand hygiene, patients are at risk of contracting a skew of hospital-acquired infections. A3. Assess the Impact of the Safety Concern on the Patient(s), Staff, and the Organization as Situated in the Identified Healthcare Setting Inadequate hand hygiene not only puts the patient at risk for serious complication, but its affects also play a huge role in the staff and organization. As patients become infected by contamination the risk in terms of the staff becoming ill is significantly high. If staff become ill, this can result in short- staffing and unsafe nurse-to-patient ratios. Healthcare acquired infections affect the organization not only financially but also on a level where the patient would rather go to another facility for treatment. A3a. Value Patients go to healthcare facilities to seek treatment. They want help. They want to get better. By not adhering to policy guidelines on proper hand hygiene you are ultimately placing no value on the patient or for the organization. When preventable complications come up, trust in the healthcare organization can be broken. That value that was once there is no longer. As healthcare professionals we took an oath to “do no harm”. It is our responsibility to value our patients and keep them safe at all costs. We also owe that responsibility to the organization we are employed through.

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