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A wide range of hand-hygiene compliance monitoring systems are available to help facilities managers decrease the growing number of health care-associated infections (HAIs). These systems are designed to monitor the patient care environment, remind personnel of critical hand-washing events and provide data to drive improved compliance. While the market penetration is relatively low, health care providers are showing more interest in using these systems, experts agree.

“An exact market penetration rate is unavailable at this time; however, electronic hand-hygiene monitoring is beginning to proliferate in the acute care setting. We believe the current growth and adoption trend will continue to increase as more health care facilities search for solutions that will impact HAI reduction,” says Jeff Hall, health care business vice president and general manager, GOJO Industries, Akron, Ohio.

While many hospitals express an interest in hand-hygiene compliance monitoring, very few have moved forward to outfit their facilities with electronic monitoring systems, says Amna Handley, MSN, R.N., CIC, clinical consultant for Georgia-Pacific LLC, Atlanta. “However, hospital decision-makers have become familiar with these systems and are more interested [in testing] solutions to better understand how they work,” she notes.

The safety and financial rewards of using these systems are spurring awareness and acceptance. “Hospital-acquired Conditions (HAC) penalties from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) are one of the driving forces,” says Paul Alper, vice president of patient safety strategy, DebMed, Charlotte, N.C. “Hospitals can lose 1 percent of their CMS revenue if they fall in the bottom 25 percent based on their HAC score — 85 percent of which will be based on HAIs such as methicillin-resistantStaphylococcus aureus and Clostridium difficile as of 2017. Hand hygiene is the simplest and most cost-effective way to prevent HAIs.”

Hand-cleaning solutions

As a result of intense pressure to improve the quality of care and avoid financial penalties associated with HACs, hospitals have amplified efforts around HAI reduction, which includes increasing hand-hygiene compliance. In response, vendors that supply the nation’s hospitals are developing compliance solutions.

enMotion dispensers from Georgia-Pacific offer touchless soap, sanitizer and paper towel dispensing, which helps to minimize cross-contamination. The dispensers are complemented by a portfolio of paper towel, soap and sanitizer options for acute care settings and the SafeHaven automated hand-hygiene monitoring system. The SafeHaven system measures hand-hygiene compliance upon entry and exits in real time and provides individual, group and unit-level compliance data via automated reporting.

Read More – Source: Hand hygiene goes high-tech

by: Neal Lorenzi is a freelance writer based in Mundelein, Ill.