Foundation Skills in Nursing Assessment - Essay Example

he nurses, since appropriate hand washing techniques are known to prevent spread of hospital-acquired infection (Lee, Huber, and Davidson, 2008, 12-17). Before beginning my care with him, I decided that I would observe the staff. As per recommendations and guidelines, one should wash hands before and after attending a patient. Therefore, before handling this patient, I went to the wash basin, took out my watch and ring, and then thoroughly rinsed my hands with water right from the elbows to the fingertips The (Infection Control Nurses Association (ICNA), 2003).

I had to repeatedly wash these areas with soap and water taking special care not to avoid any areas. The ward had adequate facilities in all patient areas and treatment rooms. I observed that the wash basins in these areas were special in that they had elbow lever-operated mixer taps and were provided with liquid soap dispensers, paper hand towels, and foot-operated waste basins. In some cases there were alcohol hand rubs and gels available along with that. I had observed in some cases, when workload was high and less time was available for hand wash, the staff is using alcohol rub instead of soap wash (Nevill and Ikeda, 2006, 12).

The RCN guidelines for hand hygiene clearly state that the hands should be decontaminated with correct techniques by washing with a soap or using alcohol solution, and this procedure needs to be stringent before direct contact with the patient or after any activity or contact with the patient including after removal of the gloves (Royal College of Nursing, 2005). Although alcohol is widely used as a rub in the clinical setting, soap and water wash is ideal, and after the wash, the hands should be dried thoroughly.

The hands of the healthcare professionals ideally should have short nails, free of polish and clean. It has been shown that wrist watches, jewellery, rings, or rings with stones carry bacteria potentially; hence they should not be worn (Royal College of Nursing, 2005).