Hand Washing Training

[synkitty]

i am the infection control officer for a small country hospital and i am currently doing an audit and teaching people the correct method of hand washing. this issue is particularly relevant for our town as we have a community based mrsa spreading through the population (boils).

i have been testing all the staff in the hospital on their technique, but i really want to make it more interesting to help people remember how important hand washing can be. i have found that the use of the ultraviolet light with the special cream has been very effective with the staff so far, but i am wondering if anyone has any suggestions on teaching methods i could use (i'm not very good at talking to people either, which makes things harder).

[chris_at_lucas_RN, RN]

I've always found that the "yuk factor" helps motivate people toward proper, responsible hygiene.

If one considers a person who hasn't washed his/her hands, using a door knob, preparing food, picking food up off a counter maybe, and then consider the microbes passed by contact and that food (or utensil or whatever) going into one's own mouth, handwashing is suddenly a great way to keep other people's cooties off one.

It's a good time to point out that if you washed your hands but the person ahead of you didn't (and I'm thinking here particularly of male toileting hygiene), grasping that doorknob lets you in for all sorts of wonderful microscopic excitement.

Good luck. I've been working on my husband and his handwashing frequency (we won't even talk about technique), and am just getting where he will wash before cutting up his supper tomato. (I don't let him handle my food, actually.....).