A letter from Fitsi Health founder, Kathleen Puri, MSN, RN in The New York Times:
Fitsi Health Founder Wins American Nurses Association Innovation Award
The Infection Prevention Strategy Honors Fitsi as One of the Top Innovations of 2018
Empowering Patients is Critical to Decreasing HAIs
Hand hygiene is the best method to prevent the transmission of infections. Hand hygiene for hospitalized patients sounds obvious – something that should be easy to accomplish and regarded as important to the patient experience. However, patient hand hygiene is a problem for most hospitals today. It is difficult to accomplish and not monitored by healthcare personnel. No infection preventionist will argue against the importance of patient hand hygiene. However, since it is neither prioritized nor measured by hospitals, it falls through the cracks. This, coupled with the fact that more and more research points to patients as the “missing link” in infection control efforts means that, in order to reduce hospital acquired infections (HAIs), hospitals need dedicated efforts to improve patient hand hygiene. Key to achieving these efforts is empowering patients to make hand hygiene easy to do on their own and to understand the critical importance cleaning their hands plays in preventative care.
This Patient-Centric Tool Tackles the Massive Challenge of Hospital-Acquired Infections
Kathleen Puri had been a nurse for many years, but it wasn’t until she became a hospital patient that the issue of hospital patient hygiene began to truly bother her. She noticed that patients confined to a hospital bed had no way to conveniently and easily wash their hands — one of the easiest ways to prevent the almost 100,000 deaths (more than those caused by diabetes or breast and prostate cancer combined) attributed to infections acquired in hospitals annually.
Holiday Babies and Their Moms Love Fitsi
New moms love Fitsi! Check out this heartwarming video of holiday newborns at St Joseph hospital.... you can see Fitsi hard at work to keep mom and baby infection free!
Fitsi Featured in Plastics Today
Fitsi bedside caddy promotes patient hygiene
Device integrates antimicrobial technology from Plastics Color Corp.
By Norbert Sparrow
April 29, 2016
A bedside caddy developed by a nurse could help combat hospital-acquired infections (HAIs) simply by making it more convenient for patients to wash their hands. Plastics Color Corp. (PCC; Calumet City, IL), a supplier of custom polymer solutions, compounds, colorants and additive masterbatches with a global footprint, brought its expertise to the project and shared this story.
We are often told that washing our hands is the first line of defense against spreading germs and contracting a cold or the flu. You would think that diligent hand washing would be second nature in a hospital setting, but the facts tell us otherwise. Public health organizations estimate that 1.7 million HAIs occur in U.S. hospitals each year, resulting in 99,000 deaths and an estimated $20 billion in healthcare costs. While basic hygiene is only one of many contributing factors to HAIs, it is a simple and remarkably effective tool. While medical personnel, we assume, follow protocol, several studies indicate that patients do not, as a rule, wash their hands as often as they should. It’s not always their fault. Many patients are bedridden, for example, and it may be painful, even impossible, for them to get to the sink. That is what prompted nurse Kathleen Puri to invent the Fitsi bedside caddy.
The Fitsi bedside caddy allows patients to keep hand sanitizer, lip balm, lotion and other basic care essentials within arm’s reach. It serves as a physical reminder to practice hand hygiene. Designed with a flat bottom and a rotatable clip, Fitsi can sit on a bedside table or conveniently attach to a patient’s bedside rail. A built-in handle allows patients to pick up the caddy and take it to the bathroom.
The Fitsi’s good influence extends beyond the patient. In its press release, PCC notes that hospital visitors are derelict when it comes to washing their hands, and, citing a New York Timesarticle, that even “hospital workers wash their hands as little as 30% of the time that they interact with patients." In this context, the Fitsi serves as a physical reminder that will help patients, their caregivers and their visitors to practice good hand hygiene, notes PCC.
Considering that the device is designed to help patients avoid infections, it’s only fitting that the Fitsi have built-in antimicrobial features, says PCC. Puri and her team settled on MicroBlok S, an antimicrobial formulation developed by PCC.
MicroBlok S inhibits the growth of a broad spectrum of microorganisms on surfaces, reduces stains and odors, and impedes deterioration thanks to the uniform dispersion of silver ions throughout a polymer matrix. The silver ions create a large internal-specific surface within the polymer, producing high-efficiency antimicrobial action, according to the company. The antimicrobial effect is not diminished over time, and the MicroBlok product line can be custom blended in a variety of resins, including TPU, PC, ABS, PP, and PE.
Chattanooga Business Radio Interview: Fitsi Health Founder Kathleen Puri
Listen here to Chattanooga Business Radio's interview with Fitsi Co-Founder Kathleen Puri. Kathy was given the opportunity to share the story of Fitsi Health and how the company is helping to achieve the goal of zero preventable hospital deaths by 2020. Kathy talks about how Fitsi is much more then a bedside caddy - it is part of the Patient Safety Movement and how important it is to advocate to improve patient safety.
Mayo Clinic Center for Innovation: Going Beyond What is Measured Today
Fitsi Health co-founder Caroline Mitchell talks about the importance of Human-Centered Design, and how this affects their process and work.
Mayo Innovation Podcast: Designing for Healthier Patients; Simple Acts of Fitsi
The idea for Fitsi is simply to give patients more. They not only made it easy for patients to clean their hands but also gave them a place to store their phones, glasses and access to comfort items like lip balm and moisturizer. It is a product designed to help patients feel more independent but also save nurses time.
The opportunities for improving the patient experience are vast. Just ask any doctor or nurse and he/she will tell you several improvements that could be made. This experience has taught the team at Fitsi that some of the best ideas for new healthcare products come from empowering those on the frontlines. It is a lot of work but belief that better design means better care, and makes everyone excited to be making a real impact in patients lives. The opportunities are endless, and listen to the whole conversation after the break!
Pasadena Magazine
