Category Archives: Hand Hygiene
Nurse Reacts to Electronic Hand Hygiene System
By Jennifer L.W. Fink, RN, BSN “This? This is a thing for nurses?” TikTokker @TheNurseErica steps aside, revealing an electronic hand hygiene system. Her skepticism and sarcasm are clearly on display. And you know what? I don’t blame her. Long-...
Leapfrog Hand Hygiene Survey: 3 Surprising Facts
You know how important your Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade is to your institution’s reputation and functioning. And you know that the Leapfrog Hand Hygiene Survey contributes to your facility’s safety grade. You probably also know that Leapfrog h...
4 Ways Technology Makes an Infection Preventionist’s Job Easier
“Technology made large populations possible; large populations now make technology indispensable.” ― Joseph Wood Krutch, American author Infection preventionists have a vitally important job: they’re charged with preventing the spread of infe...
Hand Hygiene: Move Beyond Measurement and Nurture Change
Weighing a chicken doesn’t make it fatter. That piece of wisdom comes from William Bornstein, MD, PhD, Chief Medical Officer and Chief Quality and Patient Safety Officer for Emory Healthcare. It might seem strange for a medical doctor to “weigh i...
Investment is Required to Create Resilient Patient Safety Systems
Patient safety systems must be able to withstand serious threats to patient safety. If such systems whither when confronted with staff shortages, supply chain disruptions, or infectious diseases, they cannot be considered patient safety systems. A sy...
Leapfrog Not Backing Down on Hand Hygiene Requirements
Some hospitals have asked The Leapfrog Group to relax its hand hygiene standards, says Leah Binder, Leapfrog’s president and CEO, according to a January 28, 2022 Becker’s Hospital Review article. That’s not going to happen. Becker’s Hos...
Introducing a Hand Hygiene Initiative? Follow These 3 Steps to Boost Staff Buy-In
No change initiative will be successful without staff buy-in. It doesn’t matter how inspired, impactful, or well-researched the initiative is. A hand hygiene initiative that’s projected to significantly decrease healthcare-associated infections (...
Adaptive Room Modes: Real-Time, Actionable Feedback that Adjusts to Clinical Workflows
Nurses have no patience for hand hygiene systems that interfere with their clinical workload. Given the choice between missing hand hygiene but performing timely, necessary care or diligently performing hand hygiene but missing the opportunity to pro...
The Power of Voice: Why Verbal Reminders So Effectively Improve Hand Hygiene
Most healthcare technologies use alarms to signal a need to take action. But busy healthcare providers, overwhelmed by the ubiquity of alarms in clinical settings, quickly learn to adjust their attention and often ignore the alarms. Alarm fatig...
It’s Time to Tackle 3 Persistent Hand Hygiene Myths
You know that hand hygiene decreases the risk of infection. Your staff knows that as well. And yet, if your facility is like most, your hand hygiene rates remain lower than you’d like. As noted in a 2020 article in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, r...