WORLD HAND HYGIENE DAY
World Hand Hygiene Day, marked globally on 5 May, highlights the importance of hand hygiene in health care. The slogan of this year’s campaign is “It’s in your hands – prevent sepsis in health care”, illustrating the important relationship between good infection prevention and control practices, such as washing your hands, and preventing sepsis. The World Health Organization (WHO) calls on health facilities to prevent health care-associated sepsis through hand hygiene and action on infection prevention and control. Sepsis is a life-threatening condition that arises when the body’s response to infection causes injury to its own tissues and organs. If not recognized early and managed promptly, it can lead to septic shock, multiple organ failure and death. It is a serious complication of infection, particularly in low- and middle-income countries where it represents a major cause of maternal and neonatal morbidity and mortality.
Infections acquired during health care delivery are common and are a risk factor for developing sepsis, but can be prevented. Effective hand hygiene plays a key role. “Health care-associated infections cause harm and suffering that are easily avoided. They also result in additional financial burden and sometimes even long-term disabilities or death” says Dr Jaouad Mahjour, acting WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean Apparently, Phenixcare always stresses the Hand Hygiene criteria as an important yardstick while getting a Nurse or a GDA on board the organization. It is the ABCD of Healthcare service delivery. A Doctor, Nurse or a caregiver can never deliver their services effectively if they themselves are a source of infection. Thus Hand hygiene is an important practice that we always encourage among our team of caregivers and nurses. On this day, being a Home Healthcare service provider ourselves, it gives us immense pride to say that our caregivers and nurses aren’t just certified and trained but also ‘sensitive’ enough to understand the significance of the intricate details of Healthcare service delivery. Each day, irrespective of the disease/age group/gender our Nurses and Caregivers are catering to, the first thing they do is perform Hand cleansing before they make any contact with them. This ensures a good start to the service each day which also concludes by Hand cleansing by the end of the day. Phenixcare strongly advocates the importance of Hand Hygiene among our caregivers and nurses and also encourages our clients to practice the same within the family.
