Two local hospitals are taking part in a program run by the China Disease Prevention and Control Center and a US-based medical company in an effort to establish the nation's first guidelines on hand hygiene in hospitals.

Health authorities expect to work out a national hand hygiene rule next year to regulate medical staff, most of whom don't undergo training on the issue.

The center and US-based GOJO Industrial started the program in February and launched a trial in May in eight domestic hospitals in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou. Shanghai East Hospital and Ruijin Hospital are the two local facilities involved.

"The program included a survey on medical staff's hand washing habits and how they wash their hands," said Zhu Yumin, GOJO's local agent responsible for medical staff training. "The most effective way to prevent infections within a hospital is regular hand washing, while many domestic medical workers haven't received such training and there is no rules to regulate the issue."

According to the survey, which covered about 500 doctors and nurses nationwide, only 41 percent of nurses and 16 percent of doctors wash and disinfect their hands more than three times a day. It also found that 20 percent of nurses and 34 percent of doctors dry their hands on their uniforms after washing them.

Local doctors said they have trouble in washing their hands during work, since there are not many washing facilities. Moreover, there are always four to six patients in the same ward, while there are only one or two patients in a ward in foreign hospitals.

The China Disease Prevention and Control Center estimates that Chinese doctors deal with 12 patients a day on average, while nurses handle 22 patients.

Zhu said the program introduced hand washing facilities and training used in the United States.

"Following the US hospitals, we put detergent that doesn't need to be rinsed off with water on the wall in ward areas and on nurse's carts. They can wash their hands after treating each patient," Zhu said. "If successful, the program can be promoted to more hospitals, based on the experiences in East and Ruijin."

Yu Dehua, vice president of East Hospital, said the program is working well and it is beneficial to both medical staff and patients.

(Shanghai Daily News November 3, 2004)