Dr Adeshola Abati1
1Northen Inter-Tribal Health Authority (NITHA), Prince Albert, Canada
Biography:
Dr. Adeshola Abati is a board-certified Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) Practitioner with over 15 years of work experience in various healthcare settings in developed and developing countries. He is a physician by training, but his passion for the control of infectious diseases made him pursue a career in IPC.
Abstract:
Issue: Compliance with IPC best practices among Janitors working in First Nations (Indigenous) health centres remains a challenge because of the high turnover of janitors and the lack of identical training for janitors working in health centres under the jurisdiction of the Northern Inter-Tribal Health Authority (NITHA). Hence, the IPC working group members surveyed different ways to train janitors to embrace IPC practices while performing their day-to-day activities in the health centres. So, annual janitorial workshops were identified as the most appropriate intervention. The workshop is a one-and-a-half-day event organized annually by NITHA to educate the janitors on the role of a clean environment in infection prevention and control. The aim of the workshop includes providing janitors with hands-on experience regarding dilution of disinfectants, proper donning and doffing of personal protective equipment (PPE), providing the janitors with skills they need to clean contaminated surfaces, blood and other body fluid spills, etc.
The Infection Control Advisor collaborated with the Environmental Advisors in the NITHA partnership to facilitate the workshop, which consisted of lectures, activity breaks, games, and hands-on experience. Furthermore, the facilitators invite local cleaning companies to provide more information and practical demonstrations of their cleaning equipment cleaning products.
Result: The workshop has led to increased compliance, adherence, and knowledge of IPC practices, the presence of identical training for janitors, and prompt training provision to newly hired and existing janitors.
Lesson Learned: Face-to-face janitorial workshop is a cost-effective way to train janitors and promote IPC best practices in the healthcare setting.