Surgical hand washing

Every May 5 we celebrate World Handwashing Day to make everyone aware that this simple fact can save lives and protect our health.

Hygiene in surgical care SAVES LIVES: wash your hands. Improving hand hygiene practices in surgical services is a priority.

After 10 years of the WHO program “Clean care is safer care”, these are the 10 reasons why you should participate in the campaign:

Hand hygiene at the right time saves lives.

Hand hygiene in health care has saved millions of lives in recent years.

Hand hygiene is a quality indicator that highlights the safety of health systems.

Health problems, such as infections associated with health care (IAAS), which are often invisible but nevertheless occur, are political and social challenges that we must address.

Infections can be avoided by good hand hygiene, and damage to the health of patients and health care personnel can be prevented for less than $ 10.

There is low cost technology to save lives! The alcohol-based disinfectant solution, which costs approximately $ 3 per bottle, can prevent IAAS and millions of deaths each year.

There is #handhygiene in social media, which means that it is an important issue, either due to IAAS or outbreaks due to deadly diseases such as Ebola.

Incorporating the specific moments for the action of hand hygiene in the workflow of health workers makes it easy to do the right thing every minute, every hour, every day.

Infection prevention is a fundamental part of strengthening health systems. Hand hygiene is the basis of all interventions, either when inserting an invasive medical device, manipulating a surgical wound, or when performing an injection.

The social epidemic has already begun to be transmitted with “Save lives: clean your hands”, a successful campaign that promotes the action of hand washing at the point of patient care.