Monitoring hand hygiene via human observers: how should we be sampling?

Direct observation of hand hygiene can show differences in staff compliance: Do we need to evaluate the accuracy for patient safety?

Background: Direct observation of hand hygiene is the standard practice recommended by the World Health Organization to monitor its compliance. Objective: To evaluate the accuracy of hand hygiene observation performed by units' observers. Methods: A descriptive study was carried out in seven patient care units in a 75-bed community hospital in Qatar. Four trained nurses performed hand hygiene o...

Monitoring Hand hygiene Compliance among Healthcare Workers at a Tertiary Care Center: Use of Secret Observers Is the Way Forward

'My five moments for hand hygiene': a user-centred design approach to understand, train, monitor and report hand hygiene.

Hand hygiene is a core element of patient safety for the prevention of healthcare-associated infections and the spread of antimicrobial resistance. Its promotion represents a challenge that requires a multi-modal strategy using a clear, robust and simple conceptual framework. The World Health Organization First Global Patient Safety Challenge 'Clean Care is Safer Care' has expanded educational ...

Balancing "no blame" with accountability in patient safety.

n engl j med 362;3 nejm.org january 21, 2010 275 To the Editor: Wachter and Pronovost (Oct. 1 issue)1 question the “no-blame” paradigm in patient-safety improvement and suggest the adoption of explicit punitive approaches to poorly performing physicians. We counsel caution. In a longitudinal study over a 2-year period in a large facility,2 we found that penalties did not deter undesirable behav...

Discussions of a Preliminary Hand Hygiene Compliance Monitoring Application-as-a-service

Hospital Acquired Infections (HAIs) are a global concern as they impose significant economic consequences on the healthcare systems. In the U.S. alone, HAIs have cost hospitals an estimated $9.8 billion a year. An effective measure to reduce the spread of HAIs is for Health Care Workers (HCWs)to comply with recommended hand hygiene (HH) guidelines. Unfortunately, HH guideline compliance is curr...