Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients

Paper Info
Page count 2
Word count 545
Read time 3 min
Topic Health
Type Research Paper
Language 🇺🇸 US

The plan below is the implementation of a hand hygiene program for different types of healthcare establishments where people are treated. This plan aims to incentivize the medical professionals and other personnel to ensure that they wash their hands regularly and efficiently before handling any medications or equipment while they work with patients. Also, this plan aims to inspire the enhancement of hygienic standards in these healthcare institutions. Once this program is implemented, they would learn a handwashing culture, which will improve their sanitary standards comprehension in accordance with the WHO guidelines. To ensure healthcare personnel in a facility adhere to hand hygiene, a facility should set up various monitoring tools and the central tools to consider, which will be described in this paper.

Observation

According to Pittet et al. (2017), observation as a monitoring tool involves hiring trained monitors to observe hand hygiene activities of the personnel throughout the facility. Observers follow healthcare personnel as they perform their regular activities, noting how they practice hand hygiene and how many times they do it. This tool helps identify those members not having appropriate hand hygiene other than washing hands, such as those wearing artificial nails or those without gloves in the situations they are required to wear them. However, this tool has been labeled as labor extensive and expensive, meaning small facilities might not afford to hire extra personnel to monitor hand hygiene.

Product Measurement

This compliance tool involves measuring the amount of hand hygiene products consumed. This tool indicates increases or decreases in product usage, which is interpreted as an increase and decrease in compliance, respectively. It helps identify areas where hand hygiene is not being adhered to appropriately (Facciolà et al., 2019). Although this tool is less labor-intensive compared to observation, it is not as precise as it does not account for other usages other than the healthcare personnel.

Surveys

Surveying patients and healthcare employees about their observation of how healthcare personnel practice hand hygiene is another tool to collect data on hand hygiene. According to Kakkar (2021), this tool allows gathering personal views and insight from patients. This approach helps identify concerns, examine self-perceptions and underlying issues that impact hand hygiene in a healthcare facility; however, the issue of inaccurate recall affects results.

Electronic Compliance Monitoring Systems

IT companies have designed electronic monitoring systems that can be deployed as standalone solutions. Pittet et al. (2017) reveal that electronic compliance monitoring has the ability to measure hand hygiene at 100% accuracy. This solution is not subject to manipulation or human error, and it does not overburden healthcare workers. It shows reports of visits to hygiene stations throughout an organization and missed opportunities. It encourages compliance in real-time as the system sends signals at the exact moment an opportunity is missed, thus delivering behavior correction immediately.

Integrated monitors are usually hidden from healthcare workers, which helps measure compliance in an unbiased manner. This method also saves healthcare facilities money as they do not require the installation of new fixtures; they can be attached to any dispensers or pumps already installed. This type of monitoring does not hinder workflow similar to other monitoring tools, which enhances clinical workflow (Pittet et al., 2017). Since it does not require workers to perform anything, it helps improve workflow.

References

Facciolà, A., Pellicanò, G. F., Visalli, G., Paolucci, I. A., Venanzi Rullo, E., Ceccarelli, M.,& La Fauci, V. (2019). The role of the hospital environment in the healthcare-associated infections: A general review of the literature. Eur Rev Med Pharmacol Sci, 23(3), 1266-1278.

Kakkar, S. K., Bala, M., & Arora, V. (2021). Educating nursing staff regarding infection control practices and assessing its impact on the incidence of hospital-acquired infections. Journal of Education and Health Promotion, 10.

Pittet, D., Boyce, J. M., & Allegranzi, B. (Eds.). (2017). Hand hygiene: A handbook for medical professionals. Publisher.

Cite this paper

Reference

NerdyBro. (2022, October 31). Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients. Retrieved from https://nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/

Reference

NerdyBro. (2022, October 31). Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients. https://nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/

Work Cited

"Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients." NerdyBro, 31 Oct. 2022, nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/.

References

NerdyBro. (2022) 'Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients'. 31 October.

References

NerdyBro. 2022. "Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients." October 31, 2022. https://nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/.

1. NerdyBro. "Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients." October 31, 2022. https://nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/.


Bibliography


NerdyBro. "Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients." October 31, 2022. https://nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/.

References

NerdyBro. 2022. "Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients." October 31, 2022. https://nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/.

1. NerdyBro. "Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients." October 31, 2022. https://nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/.


Bibliography


NerdyBro. "Hand Hygiene: The Need to Wash Hands Between Clients." October 31, 2022. https://nerdybro.com/hand-hygiene-the-need-to-wash-hands-between-clients/.