CoxHealth is the only health system in our area signed up to participate in The World Health Organization’s Hand Hygiene Day.
The organization is asking patients and their families to observe and record the hand hygiene practices of their care providers on Wednesday, May 5. Patients and their families will be asked to complete a brief five-question survey, and they will observe as their care providers clean their hands at five different moments of patient care. CoxHealth’s Infection Prevention department will collect the data and report the findings to WHO and receive feedback on their efforts from a global perspective.
“No matter how good we are, we know there is always room to improve,” says Susan Soetaert, CoxHealth’s director of Infection Prevention. “Participating in Hand Hygiene Day is an excellent opportunity for us to compare how we’re doing to hospitals around the world.”
The “Five Moments of Hand Hygiene” are:
• before touching a patient
• before inserting or caring for an IV, changing wound dressings or brushing a patient’s teeth, etc.
• after removing an IV, changing wound dressings, handling soiled linens, etc.
• after touching a patient, including his or her dry, intact skin
• after touching patient surroundings such as the bed, tables, monitors and when leaving the room.
Data will again be collected for one day in July and in October, and feedback from these observations as well as education and awareness activities will be presented to staff throughout the time period.
Image courtesy of The World Health Organization
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