ON Thursday the James Paget University Hospitals will be launching their “Think Pink!” campaign to raise awareness about infection prevention in the hospital and the wider community.

ON Thursday the James Paget University Hospitals will be launching their “Think Pink!” campaign to raise awareness about infection prevention in the hospital and the wider community.

With a range of eye catching posters in shocking pink, patients and visitors cannot fail to notice the important messages that help to stop the spread of infection.

Nick Coveney, Director of Nursing and Patient Care said: “We wanted to take a fresh look at all of our infection prevention information. We considered new ways of getting our message across to all our patients and visitors, with the added benefit of reminding our staff too.

“We selected the shocking pink colour in a deliberate move away from the standard yellow and black used widely for infection control. We titled our campaign 'Think Pink!'. We wanted to feature our staff in the campaign, at every level, so we developed the 'bubble poster' idea, with large photos of our staff, reminding everyone of our key infection control messages.

“Now, around every corner in the trust, you're greeted with a different member of staff, and some children too, with a comment on following the infection prevention advice 'for the health of our patients'. These, coupled with the eye-catching colour, are proving to be an excellent way to get our message across.”

Alongside the bubble posters the trust has sets of 'storyboards' which explain what Healthcare Acquired Infections (HCAIs) are, and what JPUH is doing to tackle them.

These are all over the site too. The Trust has also introduced pink surrounds for ALL the hand gel dispensers in big sizes in hard plastic. They are eye-catching at the entrance to all wards and clinics, AND easy to clean!

Mr Coveney added: “We've also got five giant pop up displays around the site (they move at night and pop up in different places!) and a range of pink notices for all our toilets to remind people about hand washing. We're also installing inserts for the floor at the entrance to ward areas in the next month or so.

The campaign has already attracted lots of interest from other trusts visiting JPUH on the back of our success in reducing the rates of C Diff. The costs for the campaign have been met by our league of friends, which has made the whole initiative very affordable indeed.”