Management measuring handsanitizer and soap usage

Nurses General Nursing

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Another recent new campaign unrolled at my hospital is the measuring of how much handsanitizer and soap is being used on the units, and comparing it with how much somebody somewhere figured out on paper that SHOULD be used, divided by the amt of pts.

We were wondering, is management short on REAL work to do? :uhoh3:

So, I had a wonderful inspiration! Every night near the end of my shift I get a towel and saturate it with handsanitizer and proceed to disinfect the unit. After all, germs can be spread via the phone, counters, doorknobs, computer keyboards, etc... ;)

Our unit won the competition, wouldn't you know it! The day nurses even got in on my sceme! :lol2:

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Specializes in NICU.

That's funny. And no doubt you had the cleanest unit in the hospital. Maybe if management has enough time to measure hand sanitizer, they could jump in and lend a hand when nurses run short. . .

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Specializes in Looking for a career in NICU.

I agree with you, that is incredibly petty. They freak out if you don't wash up for everything and then start getting upset at the amount you use.

I'm suprised they don't start putting a meter on the toilet paper in the patient's rooms and charging them by the sheet.

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Their point, actually, was to encourage usage, and monitor that we were properly disinfecting our hands, based on what an office nerd somewhere calculated that we should ber using. We were told that it's part of a national campaign. Are other hospitals doing this?

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Specializes in SICU, EMS, Home Health, School Nursing.

That is really funny! Have you guys ever seen a charge sheet that shows how much an item costs the hospital vs. how much they charge the patient? All I can say is no wonder why they can afford to not charge them for toilet paper....

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Specializes in SICU, EMS, Home Health, School Nursing.
Their point, actually, was to encourage usage, and monitor that we were properly disinfecting our hands, based on what an office nerd somewhere calculated that we should ber using. We were told that it's part of a national campaign. Are other hospitals doing this?

My hospital is not... well that I know of at least. Honestly if they did, they probably would start measuring without telling us just to make sure they got an accurate measure.

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Another weird thing they do is once a month the safety committee goes through the sharps containers to monitor compliance with the needle policies. We all think that's weird that they would be going to such efforts and removing the sharps from their safe container, and go through them. We get an email report every month on how the units are doing adhering to sharps safety.

That doesn't sound very safe, to remove the sharps from their containers. Then, they make a graph comparing departments. They are really into graphs where I work.

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Specializes in Looking for a career in NICU.
That is really funny! Have you guys ever seen a charge sheet that shows how much an item costs the hospital vs. how much they charge the patient? All I can say is no wonder why they can afford to not charge them for toilet paper....

Good point...they just built a brand new hospital near where I used to live and as my father and I were driving past we were thinking, "Can you imagine the responsibility of having to make sure a hospital has everything it needs the first day they start taking patients...and NOTHING can be missing. It has to be an astronomical process.

I hear people say that, "Hey, they charged $8 for a Tylonal...I can buy a whole bottle for less than that!"..and claim hospitals are a rip off.

They have to pay for someone to order it, cost of the product, shipping, someone to receive it, inventory it, heat/air/space to store it, a doctor to prescribe it, and a nurse to go get it and walk it down to the patient and then chart that they gave it. Then they have to pay for someone to bill for it.

These same people, never complain about paying $4.00 for a banana split at Dairy Queen when you can buy a whole gallon of ice cream for that, or $8.00 for a burger at a full service restaurant when you can buy meat and fixing for a family of 4 for the same $8

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Specializes in SICU, EMS, Home Health, School Nursing.
Good point...they just built a brand new hospital near where I used to live and as my father and I were driving past we were thinking, "Can you imagine the responsibility of having to make sure a hospital has everything it needs the first day they start taking patients...and NOTHING can be missing. It has to be an astronomical process.

I hear people say that, "Hey, they charged $8 for a Tylonal...I can buy a whole bottle for less than that!"..and claim hospitals are a rip off.

They have to pay for someone to order it, cost of the product, shipping, someone to receive it, inventory it, heat/air/space to store it, a doctor to prescribe it, and a nurse to go get it and walk it down to the patient and then chart that they gave it. Then they have to pay for someone to bill for it.

These same people, never complain about paying $4.00 for a banana split at Dairy Queen when you can buy a whole gallon of ice cream for that, or $8.00 for a burger at a full service restaurant when you can buy meat and fixing for a family of 4 for the same $8

I understand, but why charge insurance companies 200+ dollars for a bag of NS?? when realistically it only cost the hospital a few dollars if that. Ok I am going to stop now before I get onto my insurance soap-box...lol

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Specializes in ER, NICU, NSY and some other stuff.

Well you are not only paying those cost, but also for all of those folks who don't pay their bills. Just because the patient can't/doesn't pay does not make things free for the hospital.

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Specializes in Specializes in L/D, newborn, GYN, LTC, Dialysis.

our mgt is measuring these things, too and watching staff to see how often and when hand hygeine is being performed. they are taking a HARD look at us.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Cardiothoracics, VADs.

To the OP, how is this a bad thing, if the objective is improved infection control/handwashing practices, and why would you try and mess it up? That seems incredible petty to me.

I gather they have a problem with infection control if they are looking into this... surveillance audits are part of life in every IC department.

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