Each year on 5 May, we celebrate World Hand Hygiene Day – a day to acknowledge and promote the importance of hand hygiene in preventing the spread of infections.
This year’s theme, ‘Accelerate action together’ aims to unite people in support of hand hygiene, accelerate actions (and lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic) to prevent infections and antimicrobial resistance in health care, and build a culture of safety and quality around hand hygiene.
As we all know, hand hygiene is one of our strongest protections in reducing the risk of healthcare-associated infections.
One of the big calls to action for healthcare workers this year is to ‘love the 5 moments’. These are familiar to all of us and are crucial to keeping ourselves, our patients and our colleagues safe.
- Before touching a patient
- Before a procedure
- After a procedure or body fluid exposure
- After touching a patient
- After touching a patient’s surroundings
World Hand Hygiene Day also allows us to acknowledge and thank our hand hygiene auditors, who regularly observe and assess compliance with the five moments of hand hygiene. Our auditors provide feedback and education to our employees to raise awareness, improve compliance and help keep everyone safe.
For more information, including posters, procedures, and auditor training courses, visit our Hand Hygiene page.
To learn more about the global theme and calls to action, you can visit the World Health Organization’s, World Hand Hygiene Day 2023 campaign page.
Approved by A/Professor Andrew Block, Deputy Chief Operating Officer, Monash Public Health and Community