Patient Safety and Infection Control

At St. Joseph’s, ensuring patients receive exceptional and safe care is at the core of our mission to maintain and improve the health of all who come to us for care. In our work as health care providers we continuously strive to minimize the effects of injury, disease and disability for all those who come to us for care.  

St. Joseph’s patient safety and infection prevention and control initiatives are regularly reviewed and fine-tuned to ensure the safety and well-being of our patients, residents, visitors staff and physicians. This is achieved through ongoing monitoring, education, collaboration and feedback to ensure we provide the best quality health care to our patients. 

Hand hygiene

Reducing infection is everyone’s responsibility. We encourage all those who come to us for care to do their part in infection prevention and to feel comfortable reminding any care provider to wash their hands. This is an important step in being a partner in your own care. It’s ok to remind us!

As part of our commitment to uncompromising quality and safety, we are asking patients and residents to ask us to clean our hands and do their part in cleaning their own.

Thank you for your support in continuing to promote and improve hand hygiene compliance, ensuring a safe environment for all, and earning the complete confidence of those we serve. 

Please review the following documents: 

Patient Safety Initiatives

Patient safety is always in the forefront of the care provided at St. Joseph’s Health Care, London. Here are some of the initiatives underway at our hospitals to ensure the safety and well-being of our patients, staff and visitors:

Falls prevention

At St. Joseph’s Health Care London, your safety is important to us. We want you to have a safe visit.

You will see our Fall Prevention poster in outpatient and clinical areas across our organization.

Safety is everyone’s responsibility. As patients, caregivers and visitors to St. Joseph’s, you can help us prevent falls.

We want you to have a safe visit. Let our staff know if you:

  • have recently experienced a fall
  • have difficulty with balance and walking
  • are worried you might fall during your visit

If you are worried about a potential fall, St. Joseph’s has wheelchairs available for use during your visit.

How can you help prevent falls at St. Joseph’s?

St. Joseph’s need your help to identifying potential slips, trips or fall hazards to reduce and prevent possible injuries to our residents, patients, staff, volunteers and visitors.

Here’s how you can help:

  • If you see trip or slip hazards, please notify a St. Joseph’s staff member so we can ensure everyone’s safety.

  • Review the

    Falls Prevention Brochure for Patients and Families

     for strategies to support falls prevention at home or when coming into hospital.

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Connect Care is owned and operated by St. Joseph’s and based at Parkwood Institute, learn more >

Infection safety champions

 The champion initiative is a collaboration between Infection Prevention and Control (IPAC) and Occupational Health and Safety Services (OHSS). Its goal is to foster a culture of safety for both staff and patients through education, monitoring, and formal audits of infection prevention practices.

Hospital-acquired infections pose a significant safety risk for patients. The new infection safety champions will play a key role in reducing these infections, but all employees share the responsibility for maintaining safety in their areas.

Champions serve as resources for their colleagues and leaders on topics such as isolation practices, hand hygiene, additional precautions, and routine practices.

Patient Safety WalkRounds

During WalkRounds, leaders visit care units to talk with the care team about ways to improve safety. The feedback can cover various topics, including space usage, product storage, workload concerns, and helping visitors understand safety’s importance. All topics are welcome for discussion. These WalkRounds help leaders and frontline staff collaborate to enhance safety in the care and work environment.

Patient safety indicators

St. Joseph's top priority is the safety of our patients.

Health care-associated infections are a serious concern in hospitals worldwide, and we work hard to prevent and control these infections at our facilities.

Patient Safety Indicators and Infection Rates
St. Joseph's publicly reports on the following patient safety indicators and infection rates:

(Note: Rates of ventilator-associated pneumonia and central line infections are not reported because they apply to critical care units, which St. Joseph's does not have.)

St. Joseph's is not included in the annual Hospital Standardized Mortality Ratio (HSMR) report from the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) because it has fewer than 2,500 cases in each of the four years reported, making results less stable and reliable.

Our infection prevention and control practices, including environmental cleaning, follow best practices from the Provincial Infectious Diseases Advisory Committee (PIDAC) and the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care's "Just Clean Your Hands" program. Additionally, in partnership with London Health Sciences Centre, we have created a Hand Hygiene Improvement Project Steering Committee to guide the development and evaluation of a sustainable hand hygiene program, further enhancing the care we provide.