CHILDREN and young people at Nottingham's hospitals are being taught about the importance of hand hygiene - by a six-year-old girl.

Cardboard cut-outs of Harriet Vaughan will be placed in children's wards in Nottingham and other East Midlands hospitals.

Harriet, from Farnsfield, is the daughter of Nottingham University Hospitals' infection control nurse Natalie Vaughan.

The life-sized cut-outs carry the messages 'keep your hands clean' and 'clean hands keep us well'.

Linda Abolins, deputy director of infection prevention control and patient safety at NUH, said: "Infection control is our top priority at NUH and these cut-outs are an eye-catching, interesting way to reach out to children and young people and encourage them to practise good hand hygiene."

The cut-outs form part of a wider hand-hygiene campaign at NUH.

Lynn Andrews, assistant director of patient care at NHS East Midlands, said: "Effective hand hygiene is an important message for children and young people to learn from an early age, and pays dividends in everyday life as well as in healthcare settings."