Re-Educating Healthcare Providers - Essay Example

Re-Educating Health Care Providers on Hand Hygiene Practice Re-Educating Health Care Providers on Hand Hygiene Practice Problem Statement Hand hygiene prevents a variety of infections, especially in the hospital setting (Bigatello et al. 2012). The notion that patients may be victims of hospital-acquired infections challenges the basic role of hospitals, which is to make people well. However, it is certain that some patients acquire infections in hospitals, which may slow down their rate of recovery or worsen their condition. In Canada, over two hundred thousand patients acquire infections in hospitals. Eight thousand of those who acquire infections in hospital die because of the infections (Public Health Agency of Canada, 2014). Currently, researchers cannot establish the exact numbers. Nonetheless, it is evident that the number of lives lost due to infections is significant (Draelos, 2011). In the existing literature, a connection has been established between hand-hygiene and the number of hospital acquired infections. Essentially, compliance to hand-hygiene reduces the number of hospital related infections. Nonetheless, the available literature fails to clarify how a hand hygiene program seeking to enhance compliance to relevant practises such as washing and gelling after each patient would affect the rate hospital related infection. This retrospective study will provide vital insight as to the extent that such a program can reduce the rate of hospital related infections. The inferences of the statistical result would enable medical practitioners to alter their program appositely so that they are effective in curbing hospital related infections (Fraise, Maillard & Sattar, 2009). Based on what is emphasized in the program medical practitioners will determine with considerable certainty the factors which cause infections in hospitals. The lack of scholarly work on the connection between hygiene programs and infections in hospitals makes the study important. It will contribute positively to the medical discourse since it will provide a theoretical background for doctors to undertake certain measures to deal with hospital infections (Salama et al. 2013). Overall, the study will investigate an area, which the medical discipline has overlooked, yet hospital related infections lead to a significant amount of deaths. The study will establish the connection between hand-hygiene programs and hospital acquired infections. Context This retrospective study will focus on the practitioners’ adherence to the recommended practises with regard to hand-hygiene (Bhattacharyya, 2009). Therefore, the research is hinged upon the hypothesis that observing basic hand-hygiene after attending to each patient should reduce the number of infections that practitioners pick from one patient and transfer to the other (Salama, 2013). To determine if the hand hygiene program will affect the rate of hospital-acquired infections, the study will correlate the compliance to hand-hygiene practises in a period and the corresponding rates of hospital acquired infections. . The acute care hospital provides a perfect section of the healthcare sector to study. Most of the patients in this section require constant care making it perfect for study. Initially, the researcher will have to establish a base rate of infection rate and the rate of compliance to the established hand-hygiene practices as per the program, which will create a platform for comparison. The hand-hygiene re-education program seeks to enhance the medical staff members’ compliance to the established hand-hygiene practice with an aim to curtailing the rates of hospital-acquired infections (Pfoh, Dy & Engineer, 2013). The above makes it necessary to gather data on the rate of compliance to the set hand-hygiene practices such as washing hand and gelling in between patients. In current healthcare system, it I challenging to establish the correlation between the compliance rate to hand-hygiene practices and the rate of hospital-related infections. Nonetheless, it is common knowledge that compliance to hand hygiene contributes significantly to reducing infections in hospitals (Tran, 2009). As such, this research has an insurmountable challenge to establish the correlation despite all the theoretical work postulating that there is an existing connection. Methodology/Approach This study will predominately entail data collection with regard to the rate or level of compliance the hand-hygiene program. However, the study will also make use of data pertaining to the rate of hospital related infections. This research will zero in on any data that pertains to the medical practitioners’ compliance to the ideals or practises relevant to the hand-hygiene program. For instance, through surveillance, study should establish the number of times the medical staff members wash their hand in between patients or after attending to a patient before moving to another. Similarly, the study can also establish the amount of time nurses and doctors gel after attending to patients (Kumar, 2011). From the available literature review and supporting statistics, it is estimated that the medical practitioners adhere to hand hygiene about fifty percent of the times in their activities (). Fifty percent will therefore be the base rate for comparison with the data that the study will generate. The study through similar means (surveillance) should gather data on the compliance to hand-hygiene practices pertaining to six months before the commencement of the program. As such, the data obtained after the education program will be compared to two sets data; the base compliance rate established by medical bodies, which is fifty percent that the data on compliance relating to six months before the program commences. The comparison between the base rate and the compliance rate before the implementation of the hand hygiene program will ascertain if the medical practitioners who are subject to this research have realized the base level of compliance. Finally, the study should compare the data pertaining to six month before and after the program. This data will determine if the program has enhanced the adherence or compliance to relevant hand-hygiene practises. Alongside the above comparison, the researcher should compare the corresponding rates of hospital related infections for the two periods (before and after the program). Matching of the two sets of comparisons will determine the impact of the hand-hygiene re-education program on the rate of compliance to the relevant practises aimed at reducing rates of hospital related infections and the rate of infections. From the literature review, if the program improves the rate of compliance to hand hygiene practises, then there should be a considerable drop in hospital related infections. However, if there is no change in level of compliance, then the program may be deemed ineffective and no considerable reduction in hospital related infections is expected. The data collected will enable the formulation of a theory detailing how the re-education of medical personnel on hand-hygiene will affect the rate or number of hospital related infections in the acute care hospital, and most importantly its impact on the rate of compliance to hand hygiene practises by medical practitioners. By doing so, the researcher will have filled a research gap which has been overlooked for long by scholars in the medical discipline The applicability of the research findings will be limited to acute care hospitals (Zuberi, 2009). In addition, anybody seeking to apply such findings must integrate factors such as the extent of the hand-hygiene education program and the willingness of the medical staff to integrate the ideas passed on during the re-education. The applicability of the study’s findings will be inherently limited due to the particulate nature of the project. References Bhattacharyya, D. (2009). Research Methodology. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning. Draelos, Z. (2011). Cosmetic Dermatology: Products and Procedures. New York, NY: Wiley & Sons Publishing. Fraise, A., Maillard, J., & Sattar, S. (2009). Russell, Hugo and Ayliffes Principles and Practice of Disinfection. New York, NY: Wiley & Sons Publishing. Kumar, R., (2011). Research Methodology: A Step-by-Step Guide for Beginners. Thousands Oaks, CA: Sage Publication. Pfoh, E., Dy, S., & Engineer, C. (2013).Making Health Care Safer II: An Updated Critical Analysis of the Evidence for Patient Safety Practices. Bethesda MD: National Center for Biotechnology Information. Public Health Agency of Canada. (2014). The Chief Public Health Officer’s Report on the State of Public Health in Canada, 2013 Infectious Disease—The Never-ending Threat. Retrieved on July 23, 2014 from http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/cphorsphc-respcacsp/2013/infections-eng.php  Salama, M.,  Jamal, W., Mousa, H.,  Al-AbdulGhani, K.,  & Rotimi, V.(2013). The effect of hand hygiene compliance on hospital-acquired infections in an ICU setting in a Kuwaiti teaching hospital. (6) 1, 27-34 Tran, J. (2009). Comparison of Hand Hygiene Evaluations: A Literature Review. Texas: Pro-Quest Publications. Zuberi, D. Cleaning Up: How Hospital Outsourcing Is Hurting Workers and Endangering. 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