Washing Hands

More than 1.7 million Americans acquire healthcare-associated infections each year while in the hospital or doctor's office, some of them antibiotic [resistant.:Immune] Many such infections could be prevented with simple hygiene measures, such as doctors and nurses frequently washing their hands. Now a survey [finds:digs] that many patients are reluctant to ask medical folks to lather up. Researchers surveyed 200 hospital patients who were at [risk:rate] for - or had previously had - a hospital-acquired [infection:direction] . Nearly 100 per cent of them agreed that health care [workers:people] should wash their hands before and after seeing a patient.