>The hand washing experiment demonstrates there are many germs on and in the
>skin, usually "normal flora" that actually protect us.  It does not mean that
>washing is bad or unnecessary.

But it can certainly be overdone.

Jane touches on a point that is one of my present "causes."  Washing hands
with antibacterial soaps, which abound these days, interferes with the
normal, healthy environment of the skin.  The unhealthy balance of bacteria
that is set up is detrimental to healthy skin and robs us of protection,
allowing unhealthy pathogens on and through the skin.

I have a Ped dermatologist friend who says that if parents stopped washing
their babies with any soap, particularly abx soap, he would have to find
other work.  When asked when a mother should wash her baby with soap, his
reply was, "When his knees are dirty." Good old water does just fine.

I suspect that those of you in hospitals are cringing, but remember that a
hospital is a place of unhealthy flora and the rules are quite different.
Since you spend so many hours of your lives there, it can be hard to
remember that that is not the healthy environment of "home." Many measures
that are essential for the hospital setting should be shed along with those
cute gowns before one returns home.

Even if the "home" is not as clean as it "should" be, those bacteria on the
skin at home should be left there to do their job of policing the bad guys
(perhaps *especially* if the home is not as clean as it "should" be). I
think that it would serve your patients well to caution them against trying
to wipe out as much bacteria as they can once they are home. Remind them
that the procedures of the hospital are for that environment, and that it
is not doing their families a favor to wash away the good bacteria from
their skin.

The makers of hand, dish, laundry, household cleaners are capitalizing on
the misconception that killing germs is a way to health.  We are killing
off our friends and paving the way for our real enemies.


IMNSHO,

Pat Gima, IBCLC
Milwaukee, Wisconsin

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