Pharmacist participation in infection prevention: An innovative approach to monitoring compliance with the Five Moments for Hand Hygiene in a large academic medical center

Abstract

Using pharmacy residents as covert observers, we evaluated compliance with hand hygiene and contact precautions among 101 unique health care workers on entrance, exit, and inside rooms of patients with known or suspected Clostridium difficile infection. Overall compliance rates with hand hygiene upon entering and exiting patient rooms were 63.4% and 69.3%, respectively. However, there was a lack of hand hygiene inside patient rooms for the observed opportunities.