Hand Hygiene In Health Care

Hand hygiene practices are important thing to infection prevention and control practice. As health provider especially ED staff or front liner, to follow hand washing protocols is necessary in any situation. According Practice Standard (2009) four major elements to preventing practice; hand washing, protective barriers, care of equipment and health practice of nurse. Cite from Health Promotion Agency for Northern Ireland, scientists has found around 45% of infections can be prevented by washing hands regularly. MOH (2010) increasing in hand-washing compliance by

Keeping our hands clean is one of the most effcient and important steps we can do as humans to avoid getting sick or spreading germs to other people. Unwashed hands spread many diseases such as the flue, E. coli, and salmonella. Unfortunately, hand hygiene is still one of today’s most leading causes of infection in health care facilities. The risk of clinicians, patients, and visitors not complying with hand hygiene protocols creates a practice problem for nurses and their patient care. The cause of health care infections, also known as, health care-associated infections (HAIs) are increasing along with the rise of the inability to control or treat infections that are multi-drug resistant. Lack of proper hand hygiene is a major problem in clinical settings sourcing from critical care divisions where the most contaminations are prevalent. This paper will discuss how hand hygiene affects the nursing process and solutions of how to better prevent HAIs within the nursing scope of practice.

Hand hygiene has been an issue that needed enhancement. In the United States (US), 1in every 25 patients admitted in the hospital turn out to be infected, making it a total of 722,000 infections each year (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 2016). These infections can be critical and very unsusceptible to treatment. Proper hand hygiene can be used to inhibit the transmission of disease-causing agents. Healthcare workers (HCWs) should exercise proper hand hygiene to inhibit the circulation of germs to patients. Hand hygiene should be done prior to patient contact, following contact with blood, body fluids, or non-sanitized surfaces, prior to invasive procedures, following taking off gloves and patient 's contacts. In

Healthcare associated infections have an impact on patients - how? Can be prevented greatly with compliance to hand hygiene protocols (REF).

Ethical Considerations within Hand Washing Handwashing is one of the most important preventive measures when it comes to infection control and all healthcare professionals including nurses should have an ethical obligation to abide to proper hand hygiene. A study conducted by CUPE has exhibited that around 8,500-12,000 deaths in Canada per annum are attributed to healthcare associated infections (HCAI). HCAI usually develop as an outcome of the exposure to procedures and facilities of healthcare. If one needs to establish the simplest yet important nursing practice that helps in tremendous control and reduction in the contamination and infection spread, it would certainly be the maintenance of proper hand hygiene (Pratt, 2007). The various preventive practices that focus on interrupting the transmission

Hand hygiene is the most effective way of preventing the spread of infections. Most hospital-acquired infections are spread via the hands of the healthcare workers. According to the CDC, about 2 million or 1:20 patients are infected with a hospital acquired infection. Hand washing includes washing hands with warm water and soap or antiseptic hand sanitizers. (book, 540) Programs have be developed to observe the nurses, doctors, and other NICU workers to see if they were following the current hand hygiene guidelines. In this program faculty was observed for a baseline assessment then given a questionnaire asking the employees what they knew about hang hygiene. The assessment was monitored by nurses that were trained in hand hygiene and observation

Improving care can be tricky but necessary for the success of the organization. One way to improve the condition of the hospital is to ensure that patients are thoroughly examined to receive all necessary care during the initial hospital visit to lessen the chance of people returning to treat an ailment that could have been treated the first time. According to Rigby, Pegram, & Woodward, (2017), Hand washing can significantly reduce the spread of hospital acquired infections nonetheless, evidence suggests that many healthcare workers are not following the hand washing recommendation (p. 448). The organization must reiterate the importance of hand washing procedures to the staff but also inform them by avoiding this process is harmful to the

AIHW (2013) indicates that in hospital settings, the HAI is largely due to the contaminated health care staffs’ hands. Observing hand hygiene is a recognized marker of efficiency in the inhibition of the spread of diseases (Centres for Disease Control (CDC), 2002). Hence, Hand Hygiene should be a central feature in controlling and abating hospital acquired infections.

Among all nursing students and the majority of healthcare professionals, hand hygiene is understood to be a simple and important method of reducing nosocomial infections among patients. The guidelines stated by the CDC delineate specific, step-by-step recommendations in order to perform adequate handwashing. Though it may be proven and well understood, the actual compliance demonstrated by healthcare workers is severely lacking. The purpose of this literature review is to identify methods that help ensure continued compliance in reducing the transmission of communicable diseases via adequate handwashing. Approximately four research articles were selected to provide an overview of various methods used to promoting handwashing compliance. The methods used in selecting these articles were as follows: hand hygiene, improve compliance, and nursing. Articles older than seven years were excluded. An exception was made for an electronic publication detailing the history of infection control and asepsis; this was strictly chosen for its content despite being published in 2005. The following outcomes which may yield positive results were identified: increased education, implementing friendly reminders throughout the facility, installing additional handwashing stations or appropriate substitutes such as alcohol-based cleansers, and using student nurses as handwashing ambassadors. Due to the lack

Hand washing and hand hygiene are consider to be the number one, cheap essential measure of preventing and controlling spread of hospital acquired infections (HAIs). Hand washing and hygiene can significantly reduce the burden of disease, in particular in hospitalized patient Unfortunately compliance to hand hygiene recommended standard procedures by the health care workers (HCWs) has been unacceptably poor. In order to design education program, identification of several risk factors associated with poor hand hygiene (HH) compliance is of extreme importance. Objective: The purpose of this study is to implement a hand hygiene program for

Good hand hygiene is the simplest, yet proven strategy to counteract hospital infection. However, the difficulties of achieving good levels of compliance are well noted in the literature. There are several seeming barriers to carry out adequate hand hygiene:

Recent studies show that at any time, over 1.4 million people worldwide suffer from hospital-acquired infections (Public Health Ontario). In Canada alone, approximately 250 000 patients every year contract infectious micro-organisms from their healthcare providers (Nagel 18). At London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) we take pride in providing world class care in a safe, comfortable environment for patients. However, between 2008 and 2010 the LHSC still had between 20 and 30 per cent non-compliance to proper hand-washing protocol (Nagel 20). This data is very troubling considering it is following the launch of “Just Clean Your Hands” pilot project. As student nurses and volunteers of the LHSC team we are equally responsible to increase hand-washing compliance.

Hygiene has long served as a daily practice used to prevent infectious disease and maintain one’s health. Although a constant reminder, cleanliness may easily be defined as hand washing. A beginner’s step, hand washing is often skipped and deemed unnecessary. Unfortunately, many are unaware of the consequences that follow improper hygiene or lack of it. As explored by Miryam Z. Wahrman in her book “The Hand Book: Surviving in a Germ-Filled World”, numerous microbes dwell on our body, spreading from one part of the world to the other in a matter of a day, leaving millions at risk. From the metal handle in the subway to the kitchen counter of a family home, bacteria circulate and grow in every inch of living space. This basic fundamental of healthy state of living must be enforced amongst those of all ages and career fields: children, adults, employees, healthcare practitioners etc.

The lack of hand washing and/or hand sanitizing is a leading cause of nosocomial infections in healthcare facilities not only here in Nevada, but across the United States. Hand washing is one of the biggest contributing factors in stopping the spread of infections throughout the healthcare environment. Nosocomial infections could be dramatically reduced by monitoring and enforcing hand washing and/or “gel in, gel out” policies of each facility. This could also lower the length of stay per patient, and greatly reduce the medical care cost per patient.

Across the spectrum, patients can acquire an infection through their bloodstream, surgical sites, urinary tract, respiratory, and even gastrointestinal. Per Word Health Organization (WHO), “healthcare workers are often the conduit for the spread of such infections to other patients in their care.” Furthermore, numerous patients may transmit microbes without any noticeable signs or symptoms of an infection which reinforces the need for hand hygiene. (WHO, n.d.). If our facility embraces more proficient approaches for improving hand hygiene this proves we are more open to a closer inspection of our infection control practices in