Hand hygiene: how can you be sure your workplace is getting it right?

摘要

Monitoring nurses' compliance is critical for prevention of healthcare-associated infections, but it's far from straightforward. Healthcare-associated infections are the most common untoward incidents in healthcare. Such infections - known as HCAIs - include respiratory, urinary, surgical site, gastrointestinal and bloodstream infections, as well as clinical sepsis and many others. HCAIs can pose a major patient-safety risk. All have a detrimental toll on patient morbidity, mortality, satisfaction with healthcare and act as a drain on NHS resources. Meanwhile, the overuse of antimicrobial drugs, such as antibiotics, to treat such infections is aiding the development of 'antimicrobial resistance' (AMR) - a term that refers to bacterial, viral, fungal and parasitic drug resistance. Antimicrobials used to treat infections become ineffective, and infections persist in the body, increasing the risk of them spreading to others.