infection control
Smart door handle provides extra line of defence
To mark its UK launch, the product A
n innovative new door handle that sanitises hands, triples the rate of hand hygiene compliance
rates, and provides feedback on usage, has launched in the UK. Invented by Altitude Medical UK co-
founders, Dr Alex Oshmyanksy and Dr Jake McKnight when they were students at the University of Oxford; PullClean encourages people to clean their hands every time they enter and exit a room. It was developed to reduce the
spread of viruses and infections in high- footfall settings such as hospitals and care homes.
can be seen at the Science Museum as part of the new exhibition, Superbugs: the fight for our lives, which explores how society is responding to the enormous challenge of antibiotic resistance and bacteria evolving into superbugs. The exhibition runs until Spring 2019. A pilot trial of a prototype of
PullClean at the Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in the USA saw the rate of hand sanitation rise from 24% to 77% following installation. It works by placing the sanitiser in a
more-direct position and replacing two separate actions – sanitising and then opening a door – with one seamless movement. Dr McKnight said: “Our device offers
a completely-new way to clean hands. “We wanted to make it so easy for
people to sanitise their hands that it is almost subconscious. It’s a small step to
press a button when you’re already holding the handle anyway. “The irony is that handles are usually
a big transmitter of bugs, but PullClean can help stop them in their tracks and drive down unnecessary, expensive and harmful infections.” The design is simple: a tube-shaped
cartridge is placed in the centre of a hollow door handle, which releases a small amount of sanitiser when a blue paddle button is pressed. Each handle includes a monitoring
system that records a variety of data, from how much sanitiser is left in the handle and when the cartridge should next be changed, to hourly usage statistics compared to how frequently doors are opened. For healthcare settings this can include hand sanitisation rates across wards, shifts, and even entire hospitals.
www.altitudemedical.com
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healthcaredm.co.uk
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