Hand Washing

Proper Hand Washing

Teachers and parents have been trying to instill the importance of hand washing in children for years. Do you remember being in elementary school and your teacher would take the whole class to the restroom before every meal to wash your hands, and you'd get angry because all you wanted to do was hurry down to the cafeteria and eat, you didn't want to waist time washing your hands. Well washing your hands is one of the leading ways to prevent germs from spreading and making you sick. Several Diseases can be contracted just because you don't wash your hands properly. So be thankful your teacher was religious about making sure you were germ free!

According to Wirthlin's worldwide hand washing study in 1996 "People do not wash their hands as often as they think they do. Wirthlin's telephone survey found that 94% of respondents (1004 adults) claimed they always wash up after using the restroom. The observational survey viewed 6333 adults in public restrooms in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, New Orleans and San Francisco (3236 males and 3097 females) and found that only 68%, in fact, did so." If another 32% of people would realize that washing your

Koering 2

hands helps prevent the spread of illnesses such as meningitis1, influenza2, hepatitis a3, and many others imagine how healthy we could be. Dr. Semmelweis was the first doctor to make a connection between the spread of illnesses and hand washing, well over a hundred years ago. He performed an experiment after noticing a high death rate in expecting mothers being treated at the hospital. Since the doctors would go from working on a cadaver4 straight to seeing the mothers without washing their hands, they were spreading pathogenic bacteria5, which in return was killing the expecting mothers. Dr. Semmelweis had all of his student's wash their hands before examining the mothers and the death rate drop to 0%.

Now I'll explain when to should wash your hands, and the proper technique so you can help prevent the spread of illnesses. According to CCOHS (Canadians Center of Occupational Heath and Safety) you should wash your hands when they are noticeably dirty, after going to the restroom, after coughing/sneezing/or blowing your nose, before and after eating/ handling food / or smoking, after touching garbage, petting any animals or after visiting someone who's already sick.

To ensure your washing your hands properly here's a helpful guideline for you to follow. First make sure the hand washing facility you are about to use is supplied with paper towels, soap and some sort of running water. You must then remove all hand jewelry such as rings and bracelets so soap and bacteria won't get trapped under them.

Koering3

Turning on the faucet is your next step; make sure the water is warm, because using cold water won't kill the germs. Wet your hands and forearms thoroughly holding them under the water for at least three seconds. Put a nickel size amount of soap in the palm of your hand and then scrub your hands together making sure to scrub in between your fingers, under your nails, wrists, and up your forearm for at least ten seconds. If the soap hasn't started to bubble up or get lathery you haven't scrubbed hard enough. At this point you need to rinse your hands off under the running water. Making sure all the soap is gone. Now that you've scrubbed and washed the germs away you can turn the faucet off. Make sure you grab a paper towel before doing so, because when you turned the faucet on your hands were covered in germs and touching with your bare hands after washing with would really just defeat the whole purpose of what you just did. Finally grab another paper towel to dry of your hands or you can put them under an air dyer if available. Be cared not to touch an surfaces as your leaving you designated hand washing facility.

I hope after reading this you realize how important it is to wash your hands, and it only takes two or three minutes to do so. Now that you not only know the importance of washing your hands but the correct way to go about it, I hope it becomes a daily routine for you. Unless you enjoy getting meningitis, or influenza.