Hand hygiene compliance may be improved at hospitals by implementing interventions that include having administrative leadership in place, according to a study published in the American Journal of Infection Control.
As part of a study, a 636-bed, teaching hospital implemented a multifaceted hand hygiene intervention program over six months that included the administrative leadership of the institution creating a multidisciplinary hand hygiene task force to increase compliance among healthcare workers.
The task force was lead by the chairman of medicine and included a group of infection control practitioners, infectious diseases physicians, marketing team members and leaders in nursing, transportation, nutrition, respiratory therapy, engineering and safety. Together, the task force focused on improving compliance by targeting their efforts on specific interventions.
The institution then analyzed compliance rates for the preintervention, intervention and postintervention periods.
Using data from more than 25,300 observations, the institution found compliance improved over time, from 72.7 percent compliance during the preintervention period to 79.7 percent and 93.2 percent during the intervention and postintervention periods, respectively.
They also found hand hygiene compliance rates stabilized after all interventions and was sustained over 22 months.
According to the study authors, institutions should individualize their multimodal approach to include administrative leadership to achieve a high, sustained hand hygiene compliance rates.
More articles on hand hygiene:
Patient safety tool: Halyard Health's hand hygiene posters
5 most popular hand hygiene stories in February
Study: Following the hand hygiene leader