The environmental services team at Children’s Medical Center Dallas is the 2018 Environmental Services Department of the Year winner in the 250-499+ bed category. They believe that in the war on germs, hand hygiene is one of the greatest weapons in their arsenal, according to an article on the Health Facilities Management website.

One method of monitoring hand hygiene is their "secret shopper" program, according to ES Director Randall Manno, CHESP, T-CHEST, T-CSCT, is something of a secret weapon. They have dedicated personnel who watch hospital staff going in and out of certain rooms, monitoring the hand-washing process.

ES staff are trained in the AIDET [Acknowledge, Introduce, Duration, Explanation, Thanks] protocol, in which they enter patient rooms, tell them they are disinfecting their hands and repeat the process before leaving the room — again in front of the patients. 

While not every room cleaning can be monitored, the team conducts nine audits a month and then crunches the numbers to determine the hand-hygiene rate.

Read the article.