| ROCHESTER, MN - While hand washing
is the single most important procedure in hospital infection control,
how hands are dried after washing has little impact on bacteria
reduction, according to a new study by the Mayo Clinic. The study, which compares four
methods of hand drying, concludes there are "no differences"
in removing bacteria from washed hands when hands are dried using paper
towels, cloth towels, warm forced air, or spontaneous evaporation.
One hundred people participated
in the three-month study, which notes that good hand washing involves
both washing and drying of hands.
One hand of each subject was
contaminated by being placed in a sterile, quart-size re-sealable plastic
bag. The hand was then placed in another plastic bag and massaged in
phosphate-buffered water. Washing for 30 seconds with Procter &
Gamble's non-anti-bacterial soap, Camay, and warm running water was
followed by a 10-second rinse with cold water.
Conducted by medical technologist
Daniel Gustafson and Franklin Cockerel, III, MD, the study notes that
many previous studies have demonstrated the importance of proper hand
washing for removing harmful microorganisms. Fewer studies have
evaluated the effects of different methods for drying and results have
been inconsistent.
The Mayo Clinic study used cloth
towels from a rolled dispenser, paper towels from a stack on the sink,
warm air from a mechanical dryer and spontaneous, room-air evaporation.
No statistically significant
difference between pre-wash and post-dry counts of bacteria when any two
methods of drying were compared. However, the warm-air method had the
highest average numeric rank.
Although this seems to favor the
forced, warm-air method, the difference was not statistically
significant.
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