Hand hygiene important in NSW hospitals but overcrowding still the big issue
AMA (NSW) wholeheartedly agrees with Health Minister Skinner’s call for better hand hygiene amongst doctors and nurses in hospitals to minimise the risk of “golden staph” infection, however overcrowding in hospitals is a contributing factor to high infection rates and must be addressed.
AMA (NSW) Councillor A/Prof Brian Owler said, “All doctors and nurses, including myself, do their absolute best to make sure people don’t get infected while they’re in hospital. There are certainly things we can do, such as improving hand hygiene.
“However, infection rates depend on the types of patients within the one hospital. Some are extremely ill and when you have a large hospital overcrowded with patients, the risk of infection is consequently higher,” A/Prof Owler said.
“Hand hygiene is always important, but international evidence shows that there is a direct correlation between high occupancy rates and high infection rates,” A/Prof Owler said. “In NSW, the larger metropolitan hospitals have consistent and unacceptably high occupancy rates and these are the hospitals with higher infection rates.
“This is why we must tackle the overcrowding issue and work towards safe bed occupancy rates at hospitals throughout the state, to ensure these sorts of risks are minimised,” A/Prof Owler said.
“The NSW Government is the first government in Australia to commit to achieving 85% adult acute bed occupancy at 5 pm. The AMA believes that achieving this goal will make a big difference to infection rates.”
Media contacts:
Elyse Cain (02) 9902 8138 / 0419 402 955
Lachlan Jones (02) 9902 8113 / 0419 402 955
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