Hospital doctors not washing their hands

UP TO half of all hospital doctors do not wash their hands properly and are putting patient safety at risk, according to the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland.

The college’s policy group on healthcare-associated infection yesterday published a paper, What All Doctors Must Know and Do.

It says one in 20 hospital patients acquires a healthcare-related infection and a primary contributory factor is inadequate hand hygiene among healthcare professionals.

“The hands of healthcare staff are a major source of cross-transmission of micro-organisms in hospitals. Hand decontamination hygiene is considered the most important measure to reduce healthcare infections,” said the paper.

Chairman of the college policy group Prof Hilary Humphreys said the document may be “stating the obvious” but hand hygiene among doctors was “not always what it should be” and it was the group’s role to emphasise best practice.

College chief executive Leo Kearns said there was a degree of complacency about the efficacy of alcohol hand-gels.

These gels did not deal with the serious infections such as diarrhoea.

He said killing these required that the hands be washed thoroughly in water and soap with special attention being paid to the fingertips and webs between fingers.

Doctors were at risk of not adhering adequately to hand hygiene guidelines, said Dr Ciarán Donegan, consultant physician in elder healthcare at Beaumont Hospital.