How to Wash Your Hands Like You Know What You Are Doing

Cleanliness is next to Godliness, or so they say. I can't tell you if that is true or not but I can tell you how to wash your hands effectively.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Warm water
• Soap
• Paper towels
• A lovely singing voice or sense of humor

1. Turn on warm water. Too cold or too hot and you won't wash as long as you need to. Too hot may also further dry out your skin, which you definitely do not want.
2. Apply soap to hand. Bar soap or liquid soap is just fine. If you use bar soap, be sure it has someplace to drain. A bar of soap left sitting in a slimy cesspool is not exactly a good starting place for hand hygiene!
3. Lather up your hands to make a nice quantity of bubbles. This is when the singing starts. In order to be effective at removing germs you need time and you need friction. If you are using an antimicrobial soap it's still important to wash for long enough so the product can effectively kill what's on your hands. How long? 15 seconds is good according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). If it's good enough for them it's good enough for me. Trust me on that one. Try singing your ABCs, or Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, or Yankee Doodle. Each of these take about 15 seconds so if you're still singing you should still be scrubbing.
4. Times up. It's time to rinse. You want to make sure to point your hands down so that the dirty water runs off your fingers and not up your arms. Rinse until the bubbles are long gone.
5. Use either a clean towel or paper towel to dry your hands. If you're in a public restroom it's a good idea to turn off the water with a paper towel rather than your freshly clean hands or you'll be back in the same boat you were before you washed. Make sure you dry your hands thoroughly to reduce chapping.