Southern DHB spread message that ‘Clean Hands save Lives'

Southern DHB spreading the message that ‘Clean Hands save Lives’ for World Hand Hygiene Day

Tomorrow, Southern DHB will be celebrating World Hand Hygiene Day (5 May).

The theme this year is ‘Clean hands save lives’ and the DHB will be encouraging all its healthcare workers to use World Hand Hygiene Day as an opportunity to refresh their hand hygiene knowledge and pledge to make it a priority.

Special displays reminding staff about the ‘5 moments of hand hygiene’ will be put up around the DHB and Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) staff will be on hand to inform staff and patients about the importance of hand hygiene, which is vital to supporting good health, reducing the spread of infection and ultimately saving lives. IPC staff will also be handing out stickers and there’s lots of hand cut outs as reminders to practice good hand hygiene. The DHB will also be adopting the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) social media hashtag #safeHANDS. Photos of staff holding a WHO #safeHANDS promotional board will be posted via social media channels and internally on the DHB intranet.

At 11.45am on World Hand Hygiene day the IPC team and other willing staff members will be taking part in a hand hygiene flash mob in the foyer at Dunedin Hospital!

“The 5 moments of hand hygiene are well described or clear but we all need reminding about the importance of these,” said Southern DHB Director of Quality, Tina Gilbertson.

The World Health Organisation’s 5 moments for hand hygiene approach requires hand hygiene to be performed at the following times, irrespective of whether or not gloves are used:

• Before patient contact

• Before a procedure

• After a procedure or body fluid exposure risk

• After patient contact

• After contact with patient surroundings

“The DHB is keeping a strong focus on reminding its staff to always implement the five moments of hand hygiene, every day, every single time they come into contact with a patient and their surrounds,” she said.

Southern DHB is also celebrating recent figures which show its work to continually improve patient care has paid off.

Southern DHB hit a new high in its hand hygiene compliance in the results of the most recent five month audit with the DHB reaching 77.5 percent compliance at the end of March 2015, increasing its hand hygiene rate by 11 percent over the past 12 months. This is against a national DHB target of 75 percent compliance with best practice set by the Health Quality & Safety Commission.

“We’re delighted with this result which is due to the hard work of the staff and the DHBs commitment to best practice in improving hand hygiene practice. The DHB-wide goal is to continue to build on this result moving ahead and to keep improving, aiming to exceed the new National target of 80%,” said Ms Gilbertson.

ENDS

© Scoop Media