Good Hygiene and Physical Comfort

No.1 To maintain good hygiene and physical comfort 
by: Ella Rose Mamaril

Abdellah postulates that “man is the reason why nursing exists because man is the recipient of nursing”.

Promoting good hygiene and physical comfort is something we can never take away from nursing. Each and every individual who is maintaining good health will surely maintain good hygiene and physical comfort. For me, this is something embedded in our instincts as human beings. Let’s take for example newborn and infants. Crying is their only way of communicating their needs. Basically, when they cry, it’s either they are hungry, or they have soaked diapers, or simply, they just don’t feel comfortable.

As nurses, we are responsible of helping our patients maintain good hygiene and physical comfort, especially if they are unable to do so. The simple morning care and bedside care can contribute a lot in meeting this need. Positioning of bedridden patients aim to maintain physical comfort. However, these activities are the ones commonly not prioritized, or worse, not done by nurses, especially in government hospitals.

Let me share to you a personal experience. I am working in a private hospital. During my first month, we only have a maximum of 10 patients in the unit, and there are 2 staff nurses in a shift. That makes the nurse-patient ratio as 1:5. With this load, I am proud to say that we are really able to do morning care and bedside care during the night shift, at around 5 to 6 am. Because of this, we receive positive feedbacks and the nursing services office is ranked first among the departments when it comes to rendering service.  In contrast with this is my experience as a student nurse.  I graduated from a state university and we have our clinical exposure in government hospitals, where the nurse-patient ratio is 1:50-100. Imagine patients lying on their own folding beds along the aisle of the hospital. Imagine a post-operative patient with her wound eviscerated, yet still not attended by nurses or doctors. Imagine a patient complaining of pain in the past 8 hours, yet still not known by the nurse.  Quality nursing care is least of the priorities.

I may say that promoting good hygiene and physical comfort to our patients is one of the determinants of safe and quality nursing care. This is an aspect of great importance especially to those not in the medical field. When they see their loved ones well-groomed and comfortable despite illness, they are already satisfied with your nursing care. Therefore, providing good hygiene and physical comfort is something that should never be neglected, if not prioritized.

We owe our profession to man and his needs. Let’s do our best to take care of man and satisfy his needs.