The UMB Digital Archive is getting an upgrade! The upgrade requires a content freeze starting 1/27/25 and is expected to last two weeks. Any new user accounts or submissions made to the Archive during this time will not be transferred to the upgraded site. Contact ArchiveHelp@hshsl.umaryland.edu for questions.
Implementation of a Hand Hygiene Bundle to Decrease Anesthesia Workspace Contamination
Abstract
Problem: Anesthesia providers have poor hand hygiene compliance leading to microbial contamination of the anesthesia workspaces in the operating rooms at a large academic medical center in the Northeastern United States. Provider reported hand hygiene compliance at the site was as low as 0% when hand sanitizer was not available. Purpose: The purpose of this quality improvement (QI) initiative was to improve hand hygiene compliance among anesthesia providers by providing hand hygiene education, improving access to hand sanitizer, and placing visual reminders to perform hand hygiene in the anesthesia workspaces to decrease anesthesia workspace contamination. Methods: Two anesthesia providers and an anesthesia technician served as stakeholders and champions for the project. Interventions included education and placement of a hand hygiene bundle consisting of two full hand sanitizer bottles, an educational sheet, and two visual reminders to hand sanitize in the anesthesia workspaces. Data was collected using an audit tool accessed by scanning a quick response (QR) code in the anesthesia workspace. Results: 31/450 (6.9%) surveys were returned. Among the 31 returned surveys, 93.6% performed hand hygiene before and after touching the patient (n = 29), 90.3% performed hand hygiene before and after aseptic procedures (n = 28), 77.4% performed hand hygiene before and after medication administration (n = 24), 80.7% performed hand hygiene before touching clean areas of the anesthesia workspace (n = 25), and 83.9% performed hand hygiene before donning gloves and after doffing gloves (n = 26). Conclusions: Although completion of the hand hygiene surveys was poor, compliance with hand hygiene was high among the completed surveys and implementation of a hand hygiene bundle improved anesthesia provider compliance with performing proper hand hygiene.Identifier to cite or link to this item
http://hdl.handle.net/10713/22797Collections
The following license files are associated with this item: