Could You Wash Your Hands, Doc?
I just saw a CBC Marketplace that dealt with the killer hiding in so many Canadian hospitals. The news was disturbing, but really nothing new. After all, who hasn't heard/said that old line, "you go to the hospital to get sick"? To learn that the number of times it happens per year is an average 250,000 was not comforting in the least, but for me what was even more upsetting was the best advice given on how to protect yourself from becoming #250,001.
The killer is the unwashed hands of the medical personnel on whom we rely for caring and curing. The lax attitude toward cleanliness was exposed on camera by CBC's Erica Johnson and her hidden cameras in one hospital after another, most of whom then refused to talk to her after learning of the film. The advice, however, was not so much an aggressive education campaign aimed at the offenders, or a system of punitive measures to be taken against offenders, either. It was instead one more burden to be placed on those suffering from a load that may already be more than they can handle.
If you find yourself in a hospital bed, the best thing you can do is to keep a foot-pump-size bottle of hand sanitizer beside your bed. You're expected to insist that any and all medical personnel who enter the room use a liberal helping of it before they come anywhere near you. Easier said than done.
If the person is unconscious, are they up shit creek because the demand for clean hands isn't made at the bedside? What if the person is still conscious, but in such pain or fevered delirium that demanding a doctor or nurse clean their hands is the last thing on their minds?
Finally, what if the person is in a totally capable state, but they find themselves confronted by someone who firmly believes that M.D. stands for "medical deity"? You and I have both met them. They are people who will slice you up verbally for daring to even think of questioning their being beyond the reproach of any mere mortal. To willingly dare a confrontation with the personnel who might by picking up a scalpel some time in their near future is more than many, many patients would have the nerve to do. So where does that leave them?
While I understand the advice given on this segment of Marketplace is not necessarily what Johnson and her filming colleagues might think is the best answer, I think it is pathetic that is should be given at all. That even one person in Canada should be placed in the position of needing to take personal action to keep themselves safe in any of our hospitals is wrong.
Why isn't all the onus immediately placed on the medical personnel? Understaffing, budget cuts, etc. - none of it justifies medical personnel allowing themselves a personal laxness that could cost a life. If cameras were made omnipresent in our hospitals, it would help greatly in the assignment of blame. That in turn would facilitate the imposing of punitive measures. Salaries could be attached for the rest of a person's working life in order to help pay for the burden of care dumped on a patient infected with a chronic, debilitating condition by unwashed hands. There is also the possibility of a guilty party being fired and barred for life from any involvement in any health care position.
I am sure some would immediately accuse me of wanting to impose Big Brother measures on personnel whom we can trust to take the right steps without the threat of an omnipresent watching eye. The number 250,000 is the answer to that response.
Some might also accuse me of wanting to create an atmosphere of fear among already stressed medical personnel. In answer to that I would say first, there is nothing to fear from being monitored for certain behaviours if they are already something you make second nature. The guards who work in bank vaults with totally honest intent, for instance, do not live in fear of the cameras that film their every movement. Secondly, if there is an atmosphere of fear created for the health workers by being monitored for necessary behaviour, what of it? Too many hospital patients already live in fear of a stay there.
Free everyone from the worry, or impose it equally on everyone. Let's not play favourites around a question that could have a life or death answer.
The killer is the unwashed hands of the medical personnel on whom we rely for caring and curing. The lax attitude toward cleanliness was exposed on camera by CBC's Erica Johnson and her hidden cameras in one hospital after another, most of whom then refused to talk to her after learning of the film. The advice, however, was not so much an aggressive education campaign aimed at the offenders, or a system of punitive measures to be taken against offenders, either. It was instead one more burden to be placed on those suffering from a load that may already be more than they can handle.
If you find yourself in a hospital bed, the best thing you can do is to keep a foot-pump-size bottle of hand sanitizer beside your bed. You're expected to insist that any and all medical personnel who enter the room use a liberal helping of it before they come anywhere near you. Easier said than done.
If the person is unconscious, are they up shit creek because the demand for clean hands isn't made at the bedside? What if the person is still conscious, but in such pain or fevered delirium that demanding a doctor or nurse clean their hands is the last thing on their minds?
Finally, what if the person is in a totally capable state, but they find themselves confronted by someone who firmly believes that M.D. stands for "medical deity"? You and I have both met them. They are people who will slice you up verbally for daring to even think of questioning their being beyond the reproach of any mere mortal. To willingly dare a confrontation with the personnel who might by picking up a scalpel some time in their near future is more than many, many patients would have the nerve to do. So where does that leave them?
While I understand the advice given on this segment of Marketplace is not necessarily what Johnson and her filming colleagues might think is the best answer, I think it is pathetic that is should be given at all. That even one person in Canada should be placed in the position of needing to take personal action to keep themselves safe in any of our hospitals is wrong.
Why isn't all the onus immediately placed on the medical personnel? Understaffing, budget cuts, etc. - none of it justifies medical personnel allowing themselves a personal laxness that could cost a life. If cameras were made omnipresent in our hospitals, it would help greatly in the assignment of blame. That in turn would facilitate the imposing of punitive measures. Salaries could be attached for the rest of a person's working life in order to help pay for the burden of care dumped on a patient infected with a chronic, debilitating condition by unwashed hands. There is also the possibility of a guilty party being fired and barred for life from any involvement in any health care position.
I am sure some would immediately accuse me of wanting to impose Big Brother measures on personnel whom we can trust to take the right steps without the threat of an omnipresent watching eye. The number 250,000 is the answer to that response.
Some might also accuse me of wanting to create an atmosphere of fear among already stressed medical personnel. In answer to that I would say first, there is nothing to fear from being monitored for certain behaviours if they are already something you make second nature. The guards who work in bank vaults with totally honest intent, for instance, do not live in fear of the cameras that film their every movement. Secondly, if there is an atmosphere of fear created for the health workers by being monitored for necessary behaviour, what of it? Too many hospital patients already live in fear of a stay there.
Free everyone from the worry, or impose it equally on everyone. Let's not play favourites around a question that could have a life or death answer.
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