“Hospital-acquired infection” (HAI) is a serious and prevalent issue in today’s healthcare field. The Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital finds this issue to be grave and is doing all that they can to eradicate HAI for good. Hospital-acquired infections are infections that come about during the course of the hospitalization and treatment, but were not present when the patient was admitted to the hospital. According to the CDC, hospital-acquired infections show up “48 to 72 hours after admission or 10 days after discharge” (Collins, n.d.). The reason for this window of time for the infection to develop is because hospitals try to have the duration of hospital stays decreased.
These microorganisms affect the incision site itself or the tissue of the operating site. Most of these infections usually do not appear until the patient is in a rehab center or has gone home from the hospital. That is why it is critical that the nurse who cares for these patients pays attention to the site and knows the signs and symptoms of an infection. There are a couple different kinds of bacteria that cause surgical site infections. They are Staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus epidermis, Gram negative bacilli, Streptococcus, Enterococci and Clostridium perfringens.
“Make sure appropriate hand hygiene is used. Meticulous infection prevention precautions are required to prevent infections, with particular attention to hand hygiene and standard precautions” (Ackley & Ladwig, 2011, pg. 492). The nurse should also teach the patient what the signs and symptoms of infection are. “Teach the patient and family the symptoms of infection that should be promptly reported to a primary medical caregiver” (Ackley & Ladwig, 2011, pg.
(www.legislations.gov.uk, Accessed 04/10/13). Training cleaners on how to clean up after the previous patient properly and how the cups and plates should be put away, stops harm because if the cleaners had more training and cleaned up properly, there would be less infection being spread as there would be less bacteria around the ward. It also maintains the respect and dignity that should be provided for the patients that are cared for. If the recommendation was not reached, patients would be harmed by catching viruses and infection. In this case, if a patient in the ward was to catch one off these infections from dirty cups, it would be harder for them to recover due to them being elderly and having a lower immune system than someone that was young and healthy, so in some cases little infections like this from been given a dirty cup to drink from can sometimes lead to death.
ICO1: The principles of infection prevention and control. Oct 2014 Written by Laura Shaw Q: 1.1 Explain employee’s roles and responsibilities in relation to the prevention and control of infection. Employees roles and responsibilities in the care industry are all different but the one thing they all have a responsibility to do is they must always be aware of and report any individuals health changes and they also have a responsibility to keep all work areas and equipment clean, tidy and free from infection hazards. They are also encouraged to maintain good personal hygiene for themselves as well as their service users. For example when assisting a service user to have a bath, shower or to use the toilet you must always wear the PPE (personal protective equipment) provided when removing any soiled clothing you must dispose of it in the correct way using the sluice bags that are provided and the sluice bags should be tided shut thus preventing any infection among other service users clothes.
Infection- This is an invasion by and multiplication of pathogenic, micro-organisms in a bodily part or tissue which could cause harm. Infections can be spread with ease, poor practice is the main reason for spread of infection. Examples of poor practices are not washing your hands regularly, hand washing should be done thoroughly with soap and water for at least 20 seconds, followed by hand-drying with a paper towel. Another example of poor practice is not covering your mouth when you cough or sneeze. You should always get vaccinated and always use safe methods of cooking and preparing food.
Examples are; when discarding urine into the toilet after calculating in/outs, during oral care, or when dealing with open wounds or dressing changes. As I looked at the open boxes of small, medium, and large gloves I thought to myself “can’t anyone come and reach in a box and potentially spread any bacteria, fungi, or viruses from their hands to the inside and inner edges of the box.” Gloves are theoretically supposed to protect from spreading infectious agents between patients and healthcare professionals. So, what if a nurse actually exposed more infectious agents to a patient with one of the most common items used to prevent the spread of infectious agents. How ironic, I thought. Looking online, I seeked articles specifically on microorganisms that can be found on the non-sterile unused gloves.
NoThing Left Behind is “a national surgical patient safety effort to prevent retained surgical items left in patents” (Harrison Medical Center). This process helps to eliminate the human error when counting and recounting medical sponges by providing three ways to account for surgical objects. The first involves using sponges that can be detected with an x-ray, and the nurses are required to complete a sponge count to verify how many sponges are being used in the procedure. The second option does not require any technology. Instead, nurses use hanging sponge holders, similar to that of over the door shoe holders, as well as a white board to count what kind and how many surgical sponges are removed as the surgery comes to an end.
How to implement Health, Safety and Security in Health and Social Care The risks and hazards of being in a hospital setting. What the risk is: Potential Harms and Hazards: Medication If the wrong dose of medication was given to a patient then it could result in many things such as, the patient could be allergic to the medication given which could then result in more illness. Also If the patient had been given a certain drug then they could become addicted to it. Medication is a health and safety hazard. The medication throughout the hospital should be kept safely locked away and always checked to see if the patients have been given the right amount.
Roles and Responsibilities of Personnel In a health and social care setting each member of staff has a specific role when dealing with service users and the prevention and control of infections. Care workers such as nurses have a responsibility to keep the risk of infection to a minimum in a health and social care setting. They must consider themselves, their colleagues, their patients and visitors while on duty. Care workers must maintain a good personal hygiene at all times and wash hands thoroughly before and after contact with the patients that they are treating. They must also wash hands after using the toilet and before handling food.