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Infections are not only transferred from person to person, but they are also passed via a surface or an object. Harmful bacteria can be passed from a person, body fluids, or infected material to another surface. Then someone else touches the surface and the infection is passed on to the next person. This transfer can also be with infections such as the common cold. The correct workplace protocols must be followed at all times to ensure that this type of transfer is reduced or eliminated.
An example of where cross contamination could occur, is where you are treating clients, and you are wearing gloves, but then you answer your phone or use a computer with your gloves on. Later, you or a colleague then touches the phone or computer, and then the disease has been passed on. Body fluids could pass from a client onto a chair that is not protected, and then someone touches the chair and the infection passes across.
The use of proper handwashing, surface cleaning, covering equipment and PPE, added to common sense with proper cleaning techniques, will help to reduce the risk.
