NHS Nonsense or Patient Welfare?

[JAWS]

A Hospital Trust in the South of England with one of the highest rates of MRSA has decided it has to take steps towards increasing methods of preventing the spread.

I has ruled that Doctors should not wear ties. The ban extends to all those who have direct responsibility for patient care and includes jewellery, watches, scarves, wraps and other superfluous items of clothing!

In some wards I have roasted wearing just pyjamas. If the suggestions fail what ever next? Are they going to ban Shirts and blouses, trousers and skirts?
I can see an epidemic of patients dying from their Blood Pressure going straight through the roof!

Seriously though, do the suggestions sound sensible or is it a sign that they have lost the plot completely and have no real idea what to do next?

I must admit that it sounds more like wishful thinking (their ideas, not mine) than anything based on medical reality. If Hospital Infections can be transferred on ties and scarves they what about jackets and other such clothing or are Hospital Bugs fussy about their mode of transport?
"Oh no, dear, not on that nasty jacket, hop on the nice genteel tie over there!" [lol]

Hospital acquired infections are a serious matter but is this really a serious attempt a controlling them or just a case of, "Let's say something so people think we have a solution!"

[Metalattakk]

.... or just a case of, "Let's say something so people think we have a solution!"

Nail. Head. Ker-Ching!

In my honest opinion, of course. ;)

[_Ju_]

Unfortunately all clothes should be banned. How do you control how often and in which way they are being cleaned. As for ties, how many ever get washed.....just imagine a doc leaning over to examen a wound or thouthfully touching his tie after having done so but before washing. Good practice: everyone wears greens ( or blues or whites or whatever uniform is designate to their professional category) ALL the time while at work. The hospital is responsible for cleaning them, knows exactly how often and how its done and can apply high temperatures to them.

[j4bberw0ck]

Doctors, of course, have repeatedly refused to adopt American-style "scrubs". It's about time someone made it a condition of their contract.

Watched an interview on TV some months ago where Our Blair visiting a hospital; there he was chatting to a nurse and a doctor and smiling the Our Blair smile, in front of a giant bouquet of flowers which had doubtless been paid for by some overstretched budget or other to cheer the place up.

The doctor was a sight to behold; shirt, tie, scruffy tweed jacket, unbuttoned white coat over, and worst of all an enormous, bushy beard which would look impressive on a gamekeeper but on a doctor merely makes you wonder about the bacterial count..... I mean, forgive me if this is a bit near the knuckle, but MRSA and countless other bugs live quite happily in the nasal passages. So this guy sneezes, and - well, you get the picture. Who needs a handkerchief when you've got a coarse mesh filter just under your nose? Then there's his breakfast buried away in there somewhere.....

It's about time doctors weren't allowed such personal eccentricities on health grounds. Most, or many, jobs have dress codes - why not doctors?

[Through]

I find it quite difficult to believe that our hospitals have a problem because doctors wear ties. Sounds like a smokescreen to get attention away from the problems of keeping hospitals clean. Some hospitals manage better than others at this. Perhaps it's all an attempt to get funding to research whether there is a statistical correlation between the numbers of ties being worn and the cleanliness of the hospital.

[JAWS]

Unfortunately all clothes should be banned. How do you control how often and in which way they are being cleaned. As for ties, how many ever get washed..... Good practice: everyone wears greens ( or blues or whites or whatever uniform is designate to their professional category) ALL the time while at work. The hospital is responsible for cleaning them, knows exactly how often and how its done and can apply high temperatures to them.Ju, the first bit had me worried for a moment, I was hoping you were joking.:D Now I see what you were getting at you make more sense than the pathetic ideas of the Health Board. What you suggest makes sense.
I would also add that I heard an elderly ex-nurse complain about Hospital Staff she had seen travelling to and from work in their hospital clothing picking up Heaven knows what on the way. She commented that at one time that would never have been allowed to happen.

[badger]

High time someone introduced a bit of common sense into the NHS. Ju is absolutely right - all staff should change into hospital clothes before going on duty (but within the hospital) and remove them before leaving. They should be laundered daily. All rooms should be cleaned thoroughly daily, which they're not, with lavatories inspected and cleaned hourly. Handwashing should be compulsory between seeing each patient. Visitors should be far more strictly controlled. Of course once upon a time most of this happened as a matter of course, when matrons were in charge instead of "managers". There were many things to be criticised in the old systems, not least the treatment of children, but much of what was good has disappeared.

Yes Jaws, it's nonsense just like this ridiculous new computer system they plan to introduce in England. How many failed government computer systems does it take before they realise they haven't a clue what they're doing? Only hope of avoiding this one, with the inevitable chaos and mistakes, is for everyone to opt out in advance. Let's hope it never comes to Scotland. [disgust]

[Kaishowing]

There was a TV programme aired about 6-8 months ago about the state of hygiene (or lack of it) within the NHS hospitals.
After leaving various small items around wards like coins, pen lids etc....just to see if the cleaning was thorough enough, ~ about 30% of the items were still where they were left in plain sight about a week later.
I think that spoke honestly enough about the efforts to keep many of the hospitals clean within the NHS.
This programme also visited Holland (I think) where they jumped on the MRSA threat with both steel toe-capped boots on and spent millions updating hospitals where they could.
Now just as standard practice in many Dutch hospitals, wards are treated as 'clean rooms', where even something as simple as entering/exiting the room requires people to 'scrub up' and go through two doors to keep bacterial transfer to the minimum.
Until many of our old victorian style hospitals are replaced with new ones designed to meet the current medical standards, anything that can reduce the spread of germs is a positive step.
I'm amazed that the practice of having sterile clothing while working in a hospital has taken so long to become an accepted idea.
My wife and I were forced to scrub up everytime we went to visit our baby when he was in the SCBU unit at Raigmore in August. It would make far more sense to see everyone being forced to do that (at the very least) whenever entering a hospital.

[mccaugm]

Unfortunately all clothes should be banned. How do you control how often and in which way they are being cleaned. As for ties, how many ever get washed.....just imagine a doc leaning over to examen a wound or thouthfully touching his tie after having done so but before washing. Good practice: everyone wears greens ( or blues or whites or whatever uniform is designate to their professional category) ALL the time while at work. The hospital is responsible for cleaning them, knows exactly how often and how its done and can apply high temperatures to them.

I worked in theatre and our uniforms were washed on site. Nowadays staff in general wards take their uniforms home and wash them there. I doubt they boil wash them, so germs are still likely to survive. I know that you are not allowed to wear your uniform outside but I remember nursing staff flouting that rule. I think doctors and nurses should wear their own clothes to work and change into uniforms which have been boil washed on site. Ties I feel are not needed.

[j4bberw0ck]

Why not just issue paper, disposable, scrubs all round? Wear once and burn. Any contamination at all, they're changed and burned. That's what the Dutch do (see Kaishowing's post above). Doctors, nurses, surgeons and even hospital managers if they go near a ward.

I seem to remember Florence Nightingale being reputed to do great things about hygiene in the Crimean War - it's been a while; have we learned nothing?