Hand hygiene (washing with soap and water or using hand sanitizer) is the most important way to prevent the spread of infections. Germs on healthcare workers’ hands can transmit dangerous organisms to patients. For detailed information on how to clean your hands, click here.
Scary but true: It has been estimated that fewer than half of healthcare workers clean their hands as often as they are supposed to. So protect your patients and clean your hands!
The chart below from the World Health Organization shows the Five Moments for Hand Hygiene. By cleaning hands at these key times, you have the best chance of preventing the spread of germs to patients.
[table id=1 /]NOTE: Adapted from Save Lives: Clean Your Hands, a global campaign to improve hand hygiene among HCWs, and a major component of the WHO’s Clean Care is Safer Care program and AJIC May 2012 Supplement
What you can do:
Clean your hands before and after providing patient care, and during all of the five moments of hand hygiene. Encourage patients and visitors to clean their hands too. They should clean their hands before they eat, after they use the rest room, and as they enter and exit their rooms.
Learn more and share:
- It takes a team infographic—from the AHRQ Safety Program for Ambulatory Surgery (funded by AHRQ, developed by APIC and HRET)
- Hand hygiene portal—The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
- How to hand wash?—The World Health Organization
- Clean care is safer care—The World Health Organization
- Engaging patients and families in hand hygiene—Quality Improvement Organizations