Hand hygiene practices among nurses in health facility in a semi-urban setting

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: Hand is an important medium of infection transmission. This is further worsened in the hospital setting where sources of contamination are abundant. Nurses play a vital role in patient care, and while doing so, they are often exposed to health hazards. Therefore, they may act as conduits for transmitting infectious diseases to themselves, family members, and other patients. Good hand hygiene is a prerequisite for infection control; therefore, the objective of this study is to determine the knowledge and practices of hand hygiene among nurses in our institution. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study involving 113 nurses and it was conducted over 12 weeks; it was questionnaire based, which was pretested and self-administered. Convenience sampling was adopted. RESULTS: Data from 96 (85%) respondents consisting of 41 (42.7%) males and 55 (57.3%) females with male:female ratio of 0.7:1 were analyzed. All respondents reported using water and soap for hand-washing. Furthermore, majority (59%) of the respondents were not aware of the five moments of hand hygiene. Although majority (76%) reported adhering to the principles of good hand hygiene, 54.2% of the respondents could not correctly mention the steps of hand-washing technique. Sixty-six (68.8%) respondents wash their hands before attending to patients; however, almost all (99%) of the respondents wash their hands after attending to patients and after removing hand gloves. Similarly, all respondents wash their hands after using the restroom. CONCLUSION: The act of hand-washing is common among respondents in this study; however, the major challenge is with practicing the correct technique involved in hand-washing. Furthermore, knowledge of the critical moments of hand-washing was also deficient among most of the respondents.