Influencers lend a hygienic hand at STARS

The Safety and Quality team at STARS have enlisted Hand Hygiene Influencers to promote hand hygiene to the broader STARS staff team.

Staff from across the hospital can nominate to become a Hand Hygiene Influencer. Influencers are provided with education and tools to promote hand hygiene amongst their peers. They also receive an eye-catching red and pink hand hygiene polo shirt to wear. The polo shirts act as a conversation starter, providing an opportunity to talk to colleagues about the “five moments of hand hygiene”.  

Alison Pickering, Clinical Nurse Consultant Infection Control IMP, has received a great response from staff wanting to become influencers. 

“Since starting the initiative in March, 55 staff members have completed the education, including staff from all areas and professions such as medical, nursing, food services, allied health, waste services and administration,” Alison said. 

“I created this program to enable and empower staff to speak to their peers about hand hygiene, while encouraging them to provide feedback at the time of the care. 

“The influencer title was a very deliberate choice. It is about harnessing the world of the social media influencer and ‘creating a movement’, ‘having followers’ and ‘having a voice’ and getting some likes along the way. Ultimately it is about improving patient safety and reducing the risk of hospital acquired infections.” 

Amy Griffiths from Waste Services recently became a Hand Hygiene Influencer and agrees it’s important that staff from all areas of the hospital are made aware of the importance of hand hygiene.  

“Hand hygiene plays a huge role in the work that we do here in waste. We are constantly touching things that are potentially infectious or a breeding ground for bacteria. We move all around the building so without correct hand hygiene we could be spreading germs to the areas that we’re entering and the contact points along the way,” Amy said.  

“Since doing the course I have noticed that we often put the use of gloves as the priority to protect our own hand hygiene, rather than regular cleaning to prevent the contact-based transmission of germs.  

“There is certainly a time and place where gloves are necessary, but by limiting their use and changing our gloves more regularly, we become more aware of when we need to be washing or sanitising our hands.  

“It is now second nature to be cleaning my hands when entering and exiting spaces, and after touching high contamination points. These small changes to our daily routine will help protect ourselves and the people around us.”  

Hand Hygiene Influencers are just one of the Safety and Quality Team’s initiatives for improving hand hygiene at STARS. They have also implemented a quarterly interprofessional and inter-clinical hand hygiene competition. The areas with the highest percentage of compliance wins a trophy and banner to display in their area for the winning quarter.