An update on WHO 5 May 2016 resources

To support WHO 5 May 2016 Hand Hygiene Day please visit the WHO dedicated “See Your Hands – hand hygiene supports safe surgical care – Practice hand hygiene for surgical patients from admission to discharge” website here where you can now find:

• A 5 May promotional poster • A surgical-focused promotional poster – asking infection prevention and surgical teams to work together for hand hygiene

• A campaign promotional board for infection prevention and surgical teams to take a photograph together and share with others on social media using #safesurgicalhands

• A campaign avatar to use on your social media accounts, on and around 5 May • An infographic image featuring messages on surgical site infections and their prevention along the patient’s surgical journey

• A new ‘My 5 Moments for Hand Hygiene’ educational poster focusing on caring for a patient with a post-operative wound.

There are several ways to support the campaign for 5 May 2016 and we know that many of you will use your own ideas to engage your colleagues – please use also this newsletter and the wide variety of WHO campaign tools available. Importantly, WHO now provides a series of educational posters describing the moments for hand hygiene in the presence of a peripheral venous catheter, central venous catheter, endotracheal tube and a urinary catheter.

The 2016 campaign now features an additional poster for the post-operative wound. You can use these together as a package to ensure safe surgical care for every patient under your responsibility. There is also a new infographic featuring an example of the surgical patient journey to explain clearly the infection risks that can be encountered and when hand hygiene is most critical to reduce the risk of transmission and save lives. You can use the infographic in training sessions, focus group discussions, grand or morning ward rounds, or as hand-outs to surgical teams to highlight the risks and to link these with the educational posters explaining the moments for hand hygiene. Y

You have a great opportunity to do this from now until 5 May, and after this! As an additional tool, a video from the WHO Collaborating Centre at the University Hospitals of Geneva describes a patient’s surgical care journey and how hand hygiene at the right times