Hospital Acquired Infection

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.

Healthcare is an ever-growing, booming industry and as medical technology advances so should our standards of care. Once known as hospital acquired “nosocomial” infections, Healthcare Associated Infections (HAIs) are still afflicting the very patients we are to be treating. These patients could be our loved ones, friends, and family so to say that, “1 in 25 hospital patients have at least one HAI in a U.S. acute care hospital” (CDC, 2015), is still one too many.

Hospital acquired infections (HAI) will begin to display signs and symptoms within 48 hours. In order to treat the infections, physicians need to diagnostic tools quickly. The manufacturer of new diagnostic test makers, Kalorama Information stated last year that the world demand for testing and treatment of HAI will be over 10 billion dollars by the year 2015, increasing from 9 billion dollars in 2010. Kalorama also stated that HAI has a 5% infection rate of 40 million hospital visits a year, causing 100,000 deaths in the U.S. annually (Kalorama Information, July 14, 2011). Early diagnosis will improve the patient's outcome and decrease the chance of death. According to Kalorama, 20-30% of the HAI can be prevented by the simple use of better hand washing and cross contamination avoidance although the others need more intensive changes such as hospital ventilation systems and using more disposable supplies (Kalorama Information, p. 113) .

Patients have observed several physicians and nurses not washing their hands before interacting with patients. Hand hygiene is one of the largest tactics to combat nosocomial infections. The hospital should adopt a culture of 100% compliance with hand washing. The first step would be to increase handwashing stations and have more quick-dry alcohol-based antibacterial soap dispensers. Making access easier and decreasing the time taken to wash one’s hands would encourage adherence the policy. Furthermore, each floor should track hand washing and report data of potential nosocomial infections caused by improper handwashing. Keeping patients protected from bacteria is important especially when most are in an immunocompromised

(McCaughey, 2016). The Center of Disease Control recommends hand washing with vigorous scrubbing for at least 15 seconds with soap and water. Using alcohol based gel hand sanitizer can be an appropriate alternative if soap and water is not readily available but does possess drawbacks including being ineffective against alcohol resistant bacteria. Programs for surveillance have also been implemented in hospitals with the intention of monitoring staff to ensure that policies are being followed to ensure the safety of the patients. Mandated reporting of hospital-specific rates and statistics for healthcare-associated infections has the potential to serve a purpose that could result in bringing down the instance for infection. Being forced to announce to the public infections rates versus other healthcare organizations has the potential for higher administration to implement better policies to assure their good standing in the eye of the

Hospital acquired infections are best described as: “Nosocomial infections are hospital acquired infections (HAI) also known as health care associated

The occurrence of hospital acquired infections has become a norm in the health care system. Patients’ experiences of being infected with MRSA at a hospital and subsequently isolated follows 6 patients in their experiences after becoming infected with methicillin- resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) in an outbreak in Sweden. MRSA this is a staphylococcus bacteria that has become resistant to antibiotics such as penicillin, which was traditionally used to treat it (Vyas, 2015).

Health care acquired infection (HCAI) exerts a massive impact on the health care services delivery and improvement of its quality. It has been reported among leading culprits of prolonged admission, increased mortality, long-term disability and complications, emergence of multidrug resistant organism (MDRO), and they are costing healthcare services a great deal of money.(1, 2) At a given time, occurrence of HCAI is 15.5 per 100 patients in developing countries and 5 to 12 per 100 patients in developed countries. It is estimated that approximately 1 out of every 20 hospitalized patients will contract an HCAI.(3) In a summery and updating reviews done in 2014 by WHO concluded that more than a quarter of the MERS-cov infections have been

The CDC’s National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) supports 2,000 hospitals nationally (Central line-associated bloodstream infections, n.d.). Since March 2010, hospitals, in twenty one of the United States’ fifty states, are required to report their hospital acquired infections to the NHSN (Central line-associated bloodstream infections, n.d.). The CMS data report includes identification numbers for the hospitals the CLABSI happened at, the name and address of the hospitals, the number days the central line was in, the number of CLABSI incidences the hospitals had, and each hospitals’ National Healthcare Safety Network standardized infection ratio (SIR) (Tabak et al.,

Hospital acquired infections are responsible for more than 90,000 death in the United States (Fox, 2015). Some of these infections include catheter-associated urinary tract infection, central-line associated bloodstream, and ventilator-associated pneumonia. These infections mostly affect those patients with an already compromised immune system (Fox, 2015). Therefore, it is the healthcare provider’s responsibility as well as the patients to prevent spreading of these infections by taking the necessary steps like performing hand hygiene. In a study performed by Fox (2015), nurses taking care of patients in the intensive care unit were asked to wipe the patient’s hands with a 2% chlorhexidine gluconate disinfectant wipe. This product provides

Healthcare acquired/associated infections (HAIs) are caused by viral, bacterial, and fungal pathogens. These are infections we can get while we are receiving medical treatment in a healthcare facility. These infections can be serious, but are also very preventable. The most common HAIs are central line-associated bloodstream infections, nosocomial pneumonia, catheter-associated urinary tract infections, and surgical site infections. The most frequent mode of transmission of hospital-acquired infections is by direct contact. These infections are very serious and can possibly lead to death, so prevention of these infections are extremely vital. This is why hand washing, wearing gowns, and practicing sterile techniques is so important

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

Studies shows that, HAP causes 15% of hospital acquired infection. And it is the main cause of nosocomial death (Schleder 2004). This high death rate is not what the hospital bargain for. Hospitals are equipped with improved equipment’s and qualified medical personnel. Patient are still dying of acquired infection from the

Hospital acquired infections (HAI) are infections that develop in a hospital environment. This could be anything from a patient acquiring the infection during their hospital visit or the spreading of the infection amongst hospital staff. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has estimated that 1.7 million HAI’s contribute to at least 98,000 deaths per year in the United States. On a more economical aspect; the United States spends $45 billion per year on nosocomial related health problems (Schmidt, pg 31).

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.