Does Hand Washing Among Healthcare Workers Reduce Hospital Acquired Infections?

Does Hand Washing Among Healthcare Workers Reduce Hospital Acquired Infections?

Introduction

There are various simple practices that the medical, nursing and healthcare care staff are constantly asked to exercise. For example, disposing the syringes and injections properly once used, making sure the usage of clean and properly washed surgical equipment etc. However, the most commonly practiced exercise that the health care employees are strictly instructed is to do is wash their hands properly. The basic aim to be achieved by the regular hand washing practices is to ensure the reduction of infections that are most prone to be acquired in a hospital. However, if proper hand washing actually contributes towards reduction of acquired infections remains debatable.

Thesis Statement

Hand washing is a very essential practice that is to be exercised regularly by the healthcare workers. It has been proven form time to time that this practice result in a significant reduction of the diseases acquired through hospitals. However, this practice cannot guarantee to completely eliminate the threat of infections obtained through hospitals.

Overview

Various infections occur in approximately 7-10% of the hospitalized patients out of which around 80,000 die per year alone in US. Irrespective, of the fact that hand washing is now proven to be the most effective practice to control the transfer of nosocomial and other infections, the compliance in accordance to the recommended hand washing practices are unacceptably low. A combine result of various studies states that compliance level of the basic proper hand washing activities ranges from around 16% to 81%. Out of the many of these studies, only a hand full stated compliance levels in hand washing to be above 50%. One of the surveys noted that out of the 200 healthcare workers in a hospital 89% considered hand ...