When I visited a close relative in the hospital recently, I noticed a chart on the wall outside the nurses’ station, saying they had reached almost 90 percent on some activity. Then I noticed the activity was hand-washing. While that seemed like a very good number, it still meant that many doctors, nurses, aides and others were still not washing their hands. Some hospitals have even had to install cameras to track whether healthcare professionals do it.

It’s so very important because not washing your hands can bring germs which cause infections to people who are ill. Every year, over 100,000 people die of hospital-acquired infections (HAIs), and are among the top five leading causes of death in the United States. Here’s a truly scary statistic – if you’re in the hospital, 4.5 of every 100 patients admitted to the hospital will get one.

And a 2011 study found that trauma patients who developed HAIs during treatment had up to six times “the in-hospital mortality rate than similar patients without HAIs,” according to the US Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

Add to this ineffective cleaning, and many people have a very good chance of developing serious infections that may or may not kill them. All of this is what has led InPro Corporation to launch a new line of handrails, SureContact, according to a company press release. The press release quotes an article by the American College of Emergency Physicians, in which doctors agreed, "Efforts to cajole healthcare personnel to clean their hands frequently have just about topped out." The article referred to a recent study by Dr. Philip Carling of over 62,500 critical touch points in 103 medical institutions, determining that only 34% were effectively cleaned post-discharge, according to the press release.

And healthcare professionals aren’t the only ones; when my mother was seriously ill with congestive heart failure, we were required to suit up and wear gloves to even enter her room.

"Most academic articles only address hand hygiene and cleaning protocols for hospital personnel. What about the hand hygiene of patients? Even more concerning, what about the hand hygiene of visitors?" noted Mark Alan, senior vice president of product management and development for InPro, in the press release. "We believe our SureContact handrails may play a role in reducing surface contamination. It is another line of defense."

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