Barriers to Hand Hygiene Performance among Nursing Staff during the Pandemic of Corona Virus Disease

Abstract

Background: Proper hand hygiene was identified as one of the simplest most cost-effective Covid-19 prevention measures. However, there is no available evidence indicating that hand hygiene is fully practiced by health care workers. Objectives: This study aimed to assess the barriers regarding hand hygiene practice among the nursing staff at intensive care units special for covid-19 patients. Methodology: A descriptive cross-sectional design was carried out in three hospitals' Intensive Care Units from the period (20th December 2021 to 30th January 2022). A non-probability sampling method consists of (130) nurses who were selected purposively based on the study criteria. Results: The main barriers cited for not observing hand hygiene practices consistently were as heavy workload (93.1%), infrastructural deficit (90.8%), skin irritation (85.4%), and insufficient time (76.2%), respectively Conclusions: There were an overall high proportion of participants who had barriers to hand hygiene. These barriers can harm hand hygiene compliance for nursing staff which may lead to an increase the infectious diseases in hospitals. Recommendations: There is a need for optimizing hand hygiene practices by addressing the barriers, conducting continuous training programs, and providing the necessary supplies for hand hygiene to improve the attitude toward compliance with hand hygiene guidelines. Also, it is recommended to conduct future research to investigate the practices of nursing staff toward hand hygiene.