| Today, top Tayside nurse Lesley Summerhill said all nurses in Dundee’s Ninewells Hospital and Perth Royal Infirmary are being supplied with new uniforms, which are to be washed in the hospital laundry and there was no need for the uniforms to be taken home for cleaning.
Mrs Summerhill, director of nursing at NHS Tayside acute services division responsible for Ninewells and PRI, was speaking on the day the nurses professional organisation launched a campaign to tackle MRSA and other infections, highlighting “major reforms” necessary across the UK.
She made clear her organisation was “ahead of the game” and already tackling the issues highlighted by the national campaign today.
The Royal College of Nursing Scotland turned the spotlight on the need for a supply of sufficient clean uniforms and adequate laundry facilities in the Wipe It Out campaign.
Jane McCready, board chair of RCN Scotland said, “There has been a terrific amount of work to highlight the importance of hand washing in combating MRSA.
“This commitment must not waver, but we also need to extend the debate and recognise the importance of other factors.
“These factors include ensuring the supply of sufficient clean uniforms for all healthcare staff, the provision of staff changing and laundry facilities and the availability of 24-hour cleaning teams in all acute hospitals.”
New research published today in the Nursing Standard journal confirms the importance of sufficient clean staff uniforms in combating MRSA and other healthcare acquired infections.
Less than half (47%) of the English Trusts and Scottish Health Boards who responded to a survey provided their nurses with a sufficient number of uniforms to allow a clean uniform per shift. RCN Scotland believes this should be the absolute minimum.
Nearly half (43%) of the respondents questioned provided only three or four uniforms per nurse, making it difficult for nurses to change uniforms daily, or if the uniform became grossly contaminated.
Two-thirds of those questioned also provided no laundry facilities for nursing staff.
“It’s common sense that healthcare staff should have a separate uniform for every shift they work, but we know that this often isn’t the case and the implications for infection control are obvious,” said Jane McCready.
“If the Scottish Executive committed to providing just one extra uniform for each nurse working in the NHS today, they would need to provide 400,000 more uniforms. But extra uniforms are just the beginning.
“We also need to make sure hospitals provide laundry and changing facilities so staff know their uniforms have been washed at a high enough temperature and that they are not forced to travel to and from work in them. Some of our nurses report having to change in ward toilets. This is totally unacceptable.
“In the run up to the General Election we’ve heard an awful lot about how the different political parties would tackle MRSA. But we know it will be nurses and other healthcare staff who help wipe out MRSA, not politicians.”
NHS Tayside’s acute services division undertook to replace all nurses’ uniforms in the wake of an attack on a nurse in Perth Royal Infirmary. It emerged nurses felt vulnerable in see-through dresses and asked for trousers and tunics.
Mrs Summerhill said the replacement programme considered hygiene issues and all full-time nurses were being issued with eight sets of trousers and tunics. She said the “rolling programme” of replacement, which was investing around £1 million in new uniforms, was complete in PRI, where every nurse had new uniforms and was “two-thirds of the way” in Ninewells.
A further £1 million had been invested in a “batch washer”, an industrial washing machine recently installed in Ninewells’ laundry. |
