Improving Hospital Staff Compliance with Environmental Cleaning Behavior

Reducing the incidence of healthcare-associated infections requires proper environmental cleanliness of frequently touched objects within the hospital environment. An intervention was launched in June 2012 and repeated in February 2013 and August 2013 to increase hospital room cleanliness with repeated education and training of nursing and environmental services staff to reduce healthcare-associated infections at Cook Children's Medical Center. Random rooms were tested, staff were trained about proper cleaning, rooms were retested for surface cleanliness, and preintervention and postintervention values were compared. The percentage of cleaned surfaces improved incrementally between the three trials-with values of 20%, 49%, and 82% showing that repeat training favorably changed behavior in the staff (P = 0.007). During the study period, during which other infection control interventions were also introduced, there was a decline from 0.27 to 0.21 per 1000 patient days for Clostridium difficile infection, 0.43 to 0.21 per 1000 patient days for ventilator-associated infections, 1.8% to 1.2% for surgical site infections, and 1.2 to 0.7 per 1000 central venous line days for central line-associated bloodstream infections.