Infection Control Today Magazine

Hand Hygiene Monitoring

Hand Hygiene Monitoring Goes High-Tech

Although hand hygiene has been the target of continuous scrutiny, study and awareness campaigns, Erasmus, et al. (2010) say that substantial and lasting effects on compliance rates has been minimal. As healthcare institutions continue to wrestle with this issue, ...More
6 days ago
Posted in Articles, Hand Hygiene
Discrepancy Between Self-Reported and Observed Hand Hygiene in Nurses, Physicians

One of the most effective methods to promote healthcare workers’ hand hygiene (HH) is observation; an investigation of perceptions concerning hand hygiene further increases effectiveness, points out a researcher from the Department of Infection Control at Okayama University ...More
September 2, 2011
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
Direct Observation, Handrub Consumption Not Correlated, Study Finds

Direct observation (DO) and alcohol-based handrub (ABHR) consumption (AC) per 1,000 patient days are used to monitor hand hygiene (HH) performance in healthcare, and are increasingly utilized as quality indicators, sometimes for external benchmarking. Infection prevention ...More
July 29, 2011
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
Real-Time Computerized Feedback Improves Hand Hygiene Technique

Researchers from Trinity College Dublin in Ireland, the Department of Health in London, and Mid Essex Hospital Services in Chelmsford, UK, say that occlusion of observers' views make it difficult to audit hand hygiene technique. They investigated the effect of computerized ...More
July 15, 2011
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
Camera System is Part of an Automated Hand Hygiene Monitoring System

The use of alcohol-based hand rub for surgical hand preparation has been proposed and a multi-step procedure was promulgated by the World Health Organization in 2009. Researchers from Trinity College Dublin in Ireland and from the University of Alcalá in Madrid, Spain, say ...More
July 15, 2011
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
Researchers Develop Non-RFID Hand Hygiene Monitoring System

Philip M. Polgreen, MD, from the Carver College of Medicine at the University of Iowa, and colleagues, have developed a method for automatically tracking the use of hand hygiene dispensers before healthcare workers enter (or after they exit) patient rooms that is easily and ...More
December 10, 2010
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
University of Chicago Medical Center Selects Proventix Hand Hygiene Compliance Monitoring System

Proventix Systems, Inc. announces it will partner with the University of Chicago Medical Center in an initiative to improve hand hygiene quality and compliance monitoring. In this pilot, Proventix will install its nGage™ system on one clinical unit at the center. "We have ...More
October 15, 2010
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
GE Healthcare's Smart Patient Room to Begin Data Collection

GE Healthcare announced today that the Smart Patient Room pilot at Bassett Medical Center has been approved by the site’s Institutional Review Board to begin data collection. The innovative technology solution was installed as part of GE’s healthymagination initiative with ...More
October 8, 2010
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
Researchers Caution Against Bias in Hand Hygiene Compliance Reporting

In a research brief in the August 2010 issue of Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology, Sorabh Dhar, MD, and colleagues at Detroit Medical Center and Wayne State University in Detroit, describe the results of their study addressing differences in reported hand ...More
August 13, 2010
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
Direct Observation Not Always the Best Way to Assess Hand Hygiene

Researchers from Brazil and the United States report on results from their study suggesting that direct observation cannot be considered to be the "gold standard" for assessing hand hygiene compliance. Marra, et al. (2010) compared three measures of hand hygiene adherence ...More
August 13, 2010
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene