Hand Hygiene Monitoring Program

Cleaning your hands with soap and water or an alcohol-based hand rub (a product like Purell) has been shown to prevent the spread of germs that can cause infections and make people sick. The practice of keeping hands clean is called hand hygiene.

In hospitals, it is especially important that people who care for patients have clean hands. The national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has written guidelines to improve hand hygiene in health care settings.

The CDC also asked hospitals across the nation to measure how well their health workers follow the guidelines. Some hospitals do very well, while others need to improve. The CDC reports that hospitals nationwide follow hand hygiene guidelines about 40 percent of the time.

At Vidant Health, we are committed to stopping the spread of germs that can cause infection or contamination. We are careful to follow the CDC guidelines for hand hygiene. Eliminating infections saves lives and helps our patients recover sooner so they can go home and resume doing the things they enjoy.

How are we doing?

At Vidant Health, we have staff who are trained to observe and report on how well we follow the recommended hand-hygiene practices in all our hospitals. These monitors check to make sure staff members wash their hands or use the approved hand rub product before they touch a patient and at other times that require clean hands.

Choose a hospital name from the list at the right to see the results.