National Hand-washing Awareness Week

All this week has been National Hand-washing Awareness Week. Proper hand-washing is vital to good hygiene and keeping away germs that cause illnesses such as influenza.

Of course, we want all of our Concorde students, faculty and associates to remain in good health, especially around the busy holiday season. So, we decided to increase health care awareness on this subject with some helpful hand-washing techniques and procedures.

Follow these standard clean hands procedures, and you'll greatly increase your probabilities of having healthy and happy holidays.

Health care awareness on the hand-washing procedure

Jennifer Germany, Director of Concorde's Surgical Technology Program in San Diego, provided the following steps to proper hand-washing.

1. Remove all jewelry from hands and wrists.
2. Wet the hands thoroughly under running water.
3. Apply soap to hands and wrists.
4. Rub the hands together vigorously and include the backs of the hands, the interdigital spaces and the wrists. To ensure that the spaces between the fingers are adequately washed, spread the fingers and weave the two hands together, rubbing continuously.
5. Continue the hand scrub for at least 15 seconds, increasing the time after gross contact with known pathogenic surfaces, blood or bodily fluids.
6. Rinse all soap from hands.
7. Dry hands by blotting with a towel.
8. Use the towel to turn off the water faucet.

Health care awareness from Henry the Hand

The Henry the Hand Foundation, a non-profit organization focused on promoting the 4 Principles of Hand Awareness, has promoted National Hand-washing Awareness Week heavily. It makes use of Henry the Hand, an animated character, as its spokesperson for its hand hygiene behavior change program built around the four principles, which are:

• Wash your hands when they are dirty and before eating.
• Do not cough into hands.
• Do not sneeze into hands.
• Above all, do not put your fingers in your eyes, nose or mouth!

Henry the Hand points out in a letter posted on the Foundation's website that following the 4 Principles of Hand Awareness will put you in virtual isolation regardless of the people around you. Direct contamination of the mucus membranes of the eyes, nose or mouth is how infectious disease enters the body.

If we all work together, Henry said, we can minimize the fear factor of infectious disease pandemics. Only you are responsible for giving yourself the flu or flu-like illness!