Wash your hands, India is watching

[elprup, BSN, RN]

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/nyregion/hospitals-struggle-to-get-workers-to-wash-their-hands.html?_r=0

Yes, we all know we need to wash our hands. Sad thing is we all see health care workers not doing it enough. But outsorcing video to India? Wow.

[CodeteamB]

Lmao. At my hospital it is unpaid students (nursing and allied health). They are supposed to be invisible, but when someone is standing in the middle of the nursing unit with a clipboard trying to do surreptitious check marks on the same it's kinda obvious that they are judging you on something.

[XYZ***123]

So true. its funny. I came out of a room with urine in a specimen bag in a gloved hand and one glove off as per our facility policy when handling body fluids. I saw her look at me then make a check. I wonder what she checked. lol These surveys are bogus because half the people doing them do not really know what they should be looking for and are making assumptioins.

jamie

[avaloncar, BSN, RN]

You know what, something simple as washing our hands is something that is being overlooked. What is crazy is that, in the NICU/nursery, doctors, nurses and everyone for that matter scrub and wash their hands like there is no tomorrow. But for the adults and even the pediatric children, it is a huge hassle for most to stop to wash their hands, or even just to use some hand sanitizer. I know of patients/family who have asked a health care worker if they have washed their hands or to go wash their hands and received an attitude in return. Having surveillance is a great thing. Because it is filthy habit and patients are staying in the hospital longer because of nosocomial infections. We all deserve to have health care providers who care about our well being to just take 15 seconds to wash their hands. Who cares what these healthcare providers are taking home to their families because of their lax behaviors but while in the hospital, the patient is who matters the most. Outsource the video to China for all I care, someone needs to watch and keep an eye on these people.

I just hate it when I see a doctor touch an oozing something or another and just walk out of the room or better yet a nurse do it, then want to ask for my pen...no thanks.

And that post has over 200 posts in two days..insane! lol

[xoemmylouox, ASN, RN]

This is nuts!!! Next thing you know that same person who is watching you wash your hands (in another country) will also start judging the rest of your nursing skills. Who know where this will end.. Maybe they're rates will determine your raise?? only see bad things in the future with this.

[Vespertinas]

I came out of a room with urine in a specimen bag in a gloved hand and one glove off as per our facility policy when handling body fluids

I always feel guilty when I'm doing that...like people are watching me

[Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN]

If they spent less money outsourcing spies.....they could hire more staff and that would give them more time to thoroughly wash between their over load of patients. Personally, I have always found MD's the biggest offenders.

I think this is deplorable....if they want to act this way....the least they could do is hire those on public assistance and keep it in this country. Looks to me like another way to say...you aren't doing your job you are fired...when will it stop.

[PMFB-RN, RN]

My last hospital just could not get this right. All hand washing sinks are just inside the patient rooms and so were the gel dispensers. When they tried using students and orientees to keep track. Of course it was impossible for the students to see what staff did since were usually put of sight as soon as we walked into the room and they couldn't really follow us into the room without blowing their cover. They resorted to just guessing. This caused a backlash by staff. Then they moved the gel dispensers to the wall right outside the door but then handed out 3x5 cards to patients to ask their docs and nurses if they washed their hands and even gave them little cards to fill out to tell on staff. Problem is that now that gel dispenser were outside the room the patients couldn't see if staff used them or not. You would walking into the room rubbing the gel into your hands and the patient would turn you in for not washing since they didn't see it.

The other problem is that they weren't very good at keeping the dispensers filled so instead of hitting the dispenser on your way in and out of a room, it might be empty and you would have to wander around the until to find one that still had gel.