Why do hospital staff require PPE?
When people think of medical staff, they will immediately think of scrubs. Find out why hospital staff require PPE.
Scrubs are an essential form of PPE that must be worn by all those that work in a medical facility to protect people from infectious substances and bodily fluids. Keep reading to discover the importance of scrubs and other PPE in the medical field and how this can protect public health as a whole.
Protective clothing
Scrubs are, essentially, protective clothing that will create a barrier between hospital workers and hazardous substances, such as an infection substance or blood. The workwear comes in the form of nursing tunics, dresses and trousers and can be quickly changed throughout the day to protect staff and those who visit the hospital by preventing the spread of infection.
The importance of scrubs is evident when you look back at the reason they were made. The invention of scrubs can be traced back to 1918 and the Spanish Flu pandemic, which ended up killing millions of people around the world and was a lesson in the way in which viruses and bacteria spread.
Other forms of PPE
Of course, scrubs alone will not protect hospital staff, patients and the public from infectious diseases, especially those that are airborne. This is why hospital staff will also wear masks that cover both the mouth and nose to ensure the hospital staff do not get infected. Face shields and goggles are also common and usually as a way to stop blood and other bodily fluids from causing disease.
Wearing PPE at work
It is not comfortable for hospital staff to wear PPE from top to bottom, but it is essential for protecting public health. This is why employers need to make sure that all hospitals workers always have access to high-quality and enough PPE for them to use throughout their shift.
It is also important that they are taking regular breaks so that they can change PPE to avoid cross contamination, take time not wearing it in a safe environment and work to a high standard each day. Often, PPE can be washed and re-used but a lot of it will also be single-use.
The use of PPE in any medical facility is essential to stop infection from spreading. It is important not only for protecting medical staff and the people that they are treating, but also everyone else in the facility, those at home and public health as a whole. Employers must therefore make sure that there is sufficient PPE available to staff and that they are always wearing the appropriate protection.
