Patel Shila
Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust.
Nurs Times. 2004;100(1):32-4.
Much has been said in recent years about the lack of environmental cleanliness in hospitals. The House of Lords Select Committee (1998) talked about falling standards in hospital cleaning and, more recently, the government acknowledged in The NHS Plan (Department of Health, 2000) that hospitals were unacceptably dirty. Such comments may affect people's perceptions of hospitals and, rather than regarding them as safe environments that promote healing, they may be viewed as dangerous places that might cause vulnerable patients greater harm. While it is known that about 10 per cent of hospital inpatients have a nosocomial infection at any one time (Emmerson et al, 1996), there is uncertainty about whether there is a sound evidence base to support the theory that dirty hospitals cause infection.
近年来，关于医院环境卫生状况不佳的讨论颇多。上议院特别委员会（1998年）提到医院清洁标准在下降，最近，政府在《国民健康服务计划》（卫生部，2000年）中承认医院脏得令人无法接受。此类言论可能会影响人们对医院的看法，人们可能不再将医院视为促进康复的安全环境，而是视为可能对脆弱患者造成更大伤害的危险场所。虽然已知约10%的住院患者在任何时候都会发生医院感染（埃默森等人，1996年），但对于是否有充分的证据支持医院环境脏污会导致感染这一理论，仍存在不确定性。
