RED BANK, New Jersey--Ansell Limited, a leader in health-care barrier protective products, has introduced Encore HydraSoft.
The product is a powder-free, latex surgical glove with an innovative coating that helps retain moisture and hydrate the skin, enhancing the skin's natural barrier function and resulting in soft, smooth, moisturized skin that resists the effects of drying and cracking.
The Encore HydraSoft glove utilizes two moisturizers: skin-friendly glycerine, which attracts and retains water, and dimethicone, which prevents the skin from drying out, and the result is moist, rehydrated skin.
This intact skin forms a highly effective barrier that helps prevent the likelihood of developing irritant and/or allergic skin reactions and allows the skin to fulfill its natural functions more effectively.
Encore HydraSoft also features other infection control innovations, including Ansell's patent-pending SureFit technology, which provides surgeons, nurses and health-care professionals with superior barrier protection during operating room procedures.
The Encore HydraSoft expands the Ansell Healthcare glove portfolio. This enables the company to provide a complete solution for surgical glove needs.
"HydraSoft's coating consistently improves the quality of the skin on the hands of health care professionals, which is critical given that patients depend on those very hands for care," said Diego Rodriguez, Ansell Healthcare North American marketing director. "From a technical standpoint, the HydraSoft glove delivers not only consistent skin moisturizing, but also low-allergenic properties, effective barrier protection, ease of donning and double-gloving, superior performance via
its SureFit technology and, more importantly, consistent higher quality."
As a leader in infection control, Ansell developed the Encore HydraSoft glove to reduce the risk of health-care professionals experiencing the results of chronically dry and cracked skin caused by frequent in-hospital hand-washing, using alcohol-based disinfectants and frequent and long glove-wearing.
Outside the hospital, centrally heated and air-conditioned rooms, water and harsh household detergents and cleaning fluids, sun, wind and weather and a health-care professional's age and skin type can all affect skin function.
Dry skin can create a migration path for allergens, irritants and micro-organisms and can lead to infections, as well as irritant and allergic dermatitis. Encore HydraSoft's glycerine and dimethicone moisturizers help result in soft, smooth and moisturized skin--ideal for resisting the effects of dry and cracked skin.
In end-user trials in three separate U.S. facilities during actual medical procedures, users rated the Encore HydraSoft glove good or excellent, and the glove earned a 92 percent rate of acceptance on a variety of criteria, including fit and feel, tactile sensitivity and moisturizing effect.
The Encore HydraSoft surgical glove's SureFit Technology also provides even greater barrier protection to surgeons, nurses and other health care professionals. SureFit Technology overcomes the "cuff roll-down" typically experienced while wearing impervious surgical gowns designed to prevent fluid penetration.
By maintaining the surgical glove securely around the arm, SureFit Technology ensures the integrity of the sterile field by shielding the gown cuff and ensuring the efficacy of the surgical glove as a barrier protection.
Ansell designed Encore HydraSoft with a specific thickness that allows for a comfortable fit and excellent tactile sensitivity during surgical procedures with single or double-gloving. Featuring a smooth finish, Encore HydraSoft also provides worry-free instrument and suture control.
It also expands the flagship portfolio of Encore brand surgical gloves, which includes:
* Encore Acclaim--a smooth, general-purpose latex, powder-free
glove for most surgical procedures.
* Encore MicrOptic-- a smooth, micro-thin latex, powder-free
glove ideal for delicate procedures.
* Encore Orthopaedic--a textured, ultra-thick latex,
powder-free glove that provides added strength and thickness for
high-risk procedures.
* Encore--a textured, general-purpose latex, powder-free glove
for most surgical procedures.
