Washing your hands can save a life
She also stated that people visiting patients should also practice hand hygiene to avoid cross contamination.
Hand hygiene has become a great deal in quality of life and health.
Witbank Provincial Hospital hosted a hand hygiene campaign to create awareness on the importance of washing our hands and in celebration of Hand Hygiene day.
The campaign was organised by the Infection Prevention and Control and Quality Coordinator at Witbank Hospital, sister Pontsho Mokonenyane and took place on Thursday, May 9 at the hospital.
In simpler terms, hand hygiene is cleaning hands with soap and water or with an alcohol-based hand liquid.
eMalahleni Private Hospital Infection Prevention and Control and Quality Coordinator, sister Alida Stoltz, said during the campaign that hand washing has become an art nowadays.
“Bacteria and organisms change daily and you need to put in good measures to tackle them,” sister Stoltz said.
She added that people need to be responsible, care and think about the ones next to them.
Maisha Medical Sales Representative Tamara Lindi said that not only nurses and doctors should wash their hands but also patients to avoid cross contamination, which is the exchange of bacteria.
“Sometimes you can find that everyone in a ward is suffering from the same infection because lack of hand hygiene,” she said.
She also stated that people visiting patients should also practice hand hygiene to avoid cross contamination.
According to a press release issued by The Riverbed on behalf of 3M titled ‘3M salutes “unsung heroes” on Nurses’ Day 2019’, Nadine Numan from 3M said:
“Hand Hygiene Day is an initiative of the World Health Organisation and is a response to the fact that approximately one in 25 patients acquire an infection from health care workers. This shows that the foundations of nursing are solid and need to be reinforced in order not to compromise patient health and to support the huge advances in health care generally.”
