Hand hygiene Train-The-Trainers in Africa

Why a Train the Trainers (TTT) program for hand hygiene? Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) practitioners establish the institution’s hand hygiene infrastructure, lead training programs and spearhead hand hygiene improvement activities and scientific research agendas. However, there is widespread variation among the requisite elements of competence in hand hygiene worldwide. Whilst, harmonization is lacking.

The Infection Control Programme and WHO Collaborating Centre on Patient Safety at the University of Geneva Hospitals, launched a TTT program for IPC practitioners, based on the WHO multimodal improvement strategy, and its immediate impact on participant’s knowledge. This model sets the stage for standardized training of IPC practitioners worldwide. The course is organised over 3 days and uses a multimodal approach to learning. It uses a diversity of audio-visual video reviewing of real-life clinical scenari, role-plays with discussion and immediate performance feedback. Simulation-based learning for the mastery of unobtrusive direct observation of hand hygiene practices is essential for this program.

The knowledge imparted to participants is assessed through a before-and-after course evaluation tool. Our TTT comprehensive concept serves as a reference training method for IPC practitioners and health workers, to be integrated into IPC programs worldwide.

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