Please respond with a paragraph to the following question, add citations and references:

Despite every precaution and strategy put in place, patient safety, hand hygiene, medication error and donning of the personal protective equipment (PPE) are still clinical problems or issues in most health care organizations. In the organization I work, the most prevalent clinical issue is the of compliance to hand hygiene/foaming in and out of patient rooms and the use of PPE. To improve compliance of these clinical issues, infection control and nurse leaders/managers should round on the units at odd hours several times per shift to observe nursing staff and hold them accountable.

Hand hygiene, especially hand washing in any health care organization is the first and most important barrier in preventing or spreading infections among patients in the same patient, from one area of the body to the other. According to World Health Organization (2012), “When working with patients, hand hygiene should be performed in specific moments either by handwashing with soap and water or by hand rubbing with an alcohol-based formulation”. On my observation the problems of noncompliance or the inability to follow the standard performance are: the staff are always in a rush to finish their work and they argue that they are working with the same patients, so there is no need to perform hand hygiene. Hand hygiene must be performed before and after patient contact and after exposure to bodily fluids.

PPE non-compliance is also an issue at the facility I work. PPE is an important barrier for nursing staff against the spread of infection and exposure to hazardous materials. I have observed staff not utilize the PPE during patient care, especially gloves. Staff excuses are that they don’t have time to put on the PPE or that the PPE equipment is too uncomfortable. PPE, especially gloves should always be used when in contact with patients, between patients and on the same patient when attending to different areas of the body (Pyrek, 2011).

Reference:

Pyrek, K.M. (2011). Addressing challenges of PPE non-compliance. Retrieved from http://www.infectioncontroltoday.com/articles/2011/10/addressing-the-challenges-of-ppe-non-compliance-aspx

World Health Organization (WHO). (2012). WHO highlights importance of good hand hygiene for patient safety. Retrieved from http://www.who.int/mediacentre/notes/2012/hygiene_…