To demonstrate its continued commitment to patient safety, the Ontario Hospital Association (OHA) with the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care (MOHLTC), developed a campaign designed to educate patients about the importance of effective hand hygiene. This campaign has been branded, “Clean Hands Protect Lives”, and it complements the OHA’s successful, “Your Health Care – Be Involved” campaign, which was launched in September 2005.
“Clean Hands Protect Lives” aligns very closely with the “Just Clean Your Hands” program created by the MOHLTC, which was developed to help health care providers improve their hand hygiene and integrate this practice into their organization’s culture.
Effective hand hygiene practices in hospitals play a role in improving patient and provider safety, and in preventing the spread of health care-associated infections. The goal of “Clean Hands Protect Lives” is to educate and empower patients about personal hand hygiene while managing their expectations about when health care providers should clean their hands.
The campaign’s message is simple and straightforward, stating that, “Hand cleaning is one of the best ways you and your health care team can prevent the spread of many infections.” The message was developed following extensive focus group testing with patients and health care providers.
Educating patients about the importance of personal hand hygiene is a critical element in transforming a hospital’s culture and improving patient safety. Through “Clean Hands Protect Lives”, Ontario hospitals are provided with the messages and supporting materials they need to make quality improvements within their organization, and reinforce that effective hand hygiene is the responsibility of both the patient and health care provider.
The patient education and brand materials are available in high resolution electronic files to enable cost efficient reproduction. English and French files can be downloaded from OHA's website via the following links:
English Materials
French Materials
The files are also available directly from the Public Health Ontario (PHO) website in English, French, as well as twenty-six additional languages. Please click the following link to access materials from the PHO site:
Materials in Additional Languages
Please note that OHA does not produce hard-copy materials for distribution to hospitals. Should you require hard copies, these need to be ordered directly through the Government of Ontario's ServiceOntario Publications site. To do so, click here to bring up the PHO's "Just Clean Your Hands" web page, and select the "Order materials" link, which re-directs to the ServiceOntario Publications site.
For further information or questions regarding the Clean Hands Protect Lives materials, please contact the PHO at handhygiene@oahpp.ca.