Scientific Essay from the year 2017 in the subject Medicine - Public Health, grade: 1, Egerton University (Public Health), course: Infection Control, language: English, abstract: Hand hygiene has emerged as the only single strategy that has the potential for reducing hospital-acquired infections. Evidence indicates that hospital-acquired infections pose an immense hazard for patients within the hospital environment, and healthcare workers, including nurses are involved in the transmission of these infections. This explains why health organizations such as WHO, The Joint Commission and Centers for Disease Control have embarked on spearheading education and awareness on hand hygiene. Despite these efforts, evidence indicates that healthcare workers continue to exhibit low levels of hand hygiene compliance. Therefore, this essay will demonstrate how nurses can assume a leadership role within the hospital settings in accordance with the health safety standards (National Safety and Quality Health Services) as outlined by the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care [ACSQHC]. It will be discussed how nurses can adopt hand hygiene strategies to improve compliance to the national hand hygiene initiative in the wards as one of the key approaches for preventing and controlling hospital-acquired infections.