2/11/2005

Gloucestershire Community Hospitals are to be among the first community hospitals in the country to launch the hand hygiene campaign: cleanyourhands.
The campaign is aimed at improving hand hygiene among staff and visitors covering inpatient and outpatient areas. With the support of the National Patient Safety Agency (NPSA), it will be launched on 31 October.

Dr Philippa Moore, Consultant Medical Microbiologist, based at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital, explained: "We know that better hand hygiene will reduce the numbers of hospital acquired infections, reduce the length and cost of hospital stays, and ultimately save lives."

"The campaign encourages staff to clean their hands more frequently either by using alcohol hand gel or by washing with soap and water. This is important in order to stop the spread of bugs including antibiotic resistant bacteria such as MRSA."

To support the campaign, Gloucestershire community hospitals have placed alcohol gel dispensers by every patient, either at the end of the bed or on the locker, as well as near any area where clinical care is undertaken.

Posters are being displayed on the walls of every ward to remind staff that hand hygiene is important and patients and visitors are also being encouraged to support the campaign.

"As part of the campaign, visitors may see staff wearing sticky badges with the words 'It's OK to ask'," explains Dr Moore.

"This is about telling patients and visitors that staff are happy to be asked whether they have cleaned their hands before coming to care for them, for example, to change a dressing on a wound. This is an important way to stop the spread of antibiotic resistant bugs."

Patients may also see posters saying 'All hands to the Pump' - this is directed at patients and visitors saying that hand hygiene may be an issue for them as well.

If visitors are seeing and touching more than one patient on a ward, there may be a potential for spreading bugs from patient to patient, so alcohol gel will be available to visitors too.

"Staff across the county are very enthusiastic about starting this campaign for our patients," said Dr Moore.

"We are committed to improving patient care in Gloucestershire by keeping our hands cleaner. We hope that we have the full support of everyone to help us achieve this."