microlab ex. 26

Exercise 26
Effectiveness of hand scrubbing
Micro lab Section 3

Adrienne-Rae Velasquez
11/11/2008

In this exercise, my main purpose was to evaluate the effectiveness of hand scrubbing and observe the microorganisms left on my hands after all the scrubbing. In order to do this, we were given soap and hand sanitizer to “kill” or mechanically remove the microorganisms on our hands. Though I expected that after an scrubbing my hands for 2 minutes, my hands would be without any microorganisms, I was proven wrong. By the results on my plate, there was still an efficient amount of growth. I had also thought that rinsing my hands would decrease the amount of germs on my hands, but it so happens that after the third time of rinsing, I actually had more colonies than when I first started. It may have been that the water was contaminated, but it definitely wasn’t anything I expected. Another thing, after the hand sanitizer, I expected that I would have less growth on my hands, but the hand sanitizer seemed to have no effect what so ever. From this exercise, I had learned that even with thorough scrubbing, microorganisms still may exist on your hands. This comes to show why surgeons must over scrub!