Creating Health Applications for Schools
Creating Health Applications for Schools
Jasminka Criley, CEO, Professor in Medicine, Indelible Learning, UCLAHEALTHCARE
Jasminka Criley
Good hand hygiene depends upon knowing when to wash, how to wash, and consistent practice. While existing educational content may effectively portray when children (or adults) should wash their hands, there are significant barriers to progress in handwashing technique. First, most educational content does not employ accurate hand anatomy, depriving learners of understanding which areas of the hands are cleaned by which scrubbing steps. Second, handwashing lacks an obvious failure mode: neither a child nor an adult can see, merely by inspection, whether the hands have been adequately cleaned after washing. Finally, without trials of handwashing training that measure actual performance at the sink, the efficacy of the educational content is difficult to evaluate. After a brief review of current approaches to improving hand hygiene in school and clinical settings, and background on the relevant pathogens and modes of transmission, participants will be able to download and play a learning game (Bubble Beats) developed with funding from the National Institutes of Health. Finally, participants will use best practices to choose, implement, and evaluate health content programs for their schools and organizations.
Attendee Benefits
Participants will be able to identify the four components to successful hand hygiene programs (availability, when to wash, how to wash, and consistent practice) as one of the mainstays to infection prevention. Participants will be able to practice hand hygiene skills to World Health Organization healthcare standards. Participants will reflect and review current hand hygiene practices in their organizations, in particular addressing the unmet needs for standardized training in technique and formation of healthy habits. Participants will be able to justify the benefits of a comprehensive hand hygiene program to administrators, in terms of reducing lost days of instruction, improved staff health, meeting health education content standards (for educators) and other standards and/or regulations.