Role of Leadership in Infection Risk Management in NZ Healthcare Essay

This essay examines the crucial role of leadership in infection risk management within a New Zealand healthcare facility, specifically referencing Southern Cross Healthcare Group. It highlights the significance of infection control as a critical aspect of healthcare, emphasizing how leadership skills, including teamwork, communication, and problem-solving, are essential for effective hygiene management. The essay argues that transformational and authentic leadership are vital for implementing changes and improvements in infection management, such as hand hygiene, quality of care, and patient observation. It underscores the importance of continuous quality assessment and the development of management plans to mitigate infection risks, ultimately focusing on how effective leadership strategies can positively influence change within healthcare systems and improve patient outcomes. The essay references several key publications that support its arguments, including the Journal of Hospital Infection and the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.

Running head: LEADERSHIP IN INFECTION RISK MANAGEMENT
LEADERSHIP IN INFECTION RISK MANAGEMENT
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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LEADERSHIP IN INFECTION RISK MANAGEMENT
This essay briefly discusses the role of leadership in infection risk management through a
large healthcare facility of New Zealand.
Infection control is one of the most prominent aspects of the health care. It has been seen
that the infection develops the most critical issues for the health care professionals. In this
context, it has been seen that the process of the hygiene management and the infection control
are related factors in the health care system. Southern Cross Healthcare Group is well known for
the quality service providence (Southern Cross Hospitals NZ, 2020). However, the process of the
health care is always needed to consider the leadership management. Hence, the factor of the
infection management should be considering of the leadership skills for the change and
improvement. The skills comprise of teamwork, appreciation, proper communication and active
listening, problem solving and critical analysis along with the situational management (Wong,
2018). The infection control of the facility has been marked as one of the advance process as
well. However, it can be stated that the process of infection control is dependent on the
continuous quality assessment and control. Thus, the process of the infection controls the
responsibility of the quality management team of the health care facility. Moreover, the
management team of the facility has to develop different plans for the infection management. In
this context, leadership management is the most effective process of the health care leader of
facility (Gould, Gallagher & Allen, 2016). Thus, the implementation of the transformational
leadership is needed for the implementation of the change in the infection management and the
process of the improvement of the infection management. Hence, the improvement and the risk
management of the infection issues should be considered with highest priority by the leaders. All
these factors are focusing on the process of the leadership management that is the
transformational leadership. Thus, the transformational leadership along with the authentic

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LEADERSHIP IN INFECTION RISK MANAGEMENT
leadership will be the factors that can be useful in the process of the infection risk management
such as the hand hygiene, quality of care and proper observation of the patients for the infections
risks. Moreover, the process of the care and the infection risk management is focused on the
factor of the change and the managing the change in a positive direction with the consideration
of the proper leadership strategies (Van Rossum et al., 2016).

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LEADERSHIP IN INFECTION RISK MANAGEMENT
References
Gould, D. J., Gallagher, R., & Allen, D. (2016). Leadership and management for infection
prevention and control: what do we have and what do we need?. Journal of Hospital
Infection, 94(2), 165-168.
Southern Cross Hospitals NZ. (2020). Home. Retrieved 14 January 2020, from
https://hospitals.southerncross.co.nz/?_ga=2.262270348.1429437828.1579006313-
593490214.1579006313
Van Rossum, L., Aij, K. H., Simons, F. E., van der Eng, N., & ten Have, W. D. (2016). Lean
healthcare from a change management perspective: the role of leadership and workforce
flexibility in an operating theatre. Journal of health organization and management, 30(3),
475-493.
Wong, L. P. (2018). Systems thinking and leadership: how nephrologists can transform dialysis
safety to prevent infections. Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology,
13(4), 655-662.