Practice of Standard Safety Measures among Nursing Personnel at Tertiary Mental Health Institute, North-East, India

Abstract

Background: Health care-associated infection (HAI) is a serious problem that deeply impacts patient safety and is a major cause of patient morbidity and mortality. Adherence to standard safety measures while performing procedures and related infection control measures is a part of nurses responsibility as it protects patients and health care workers from transmission of health-care associated infections. Assessing practice of standard safety measures while performing nursing procedures is immensely important so that necessary changes can be brought to enhanced quality nursing care. Methodology: The study adopted an observational descriptive research design. The setting of the study was the Tertiary Mental Health Institute, North-East, India. The sample of the study consisted of the thirty eight (38) nursing personnel who performed the total 150 procedures i.e. 30 times of each five domains (waste disposal, intramuscular injection, intravenous injection, hand-washing, aseptic wound dressing). Convenience sampling technique was used. Result: Finding showed that all the nursing personnel followed proper waste disposal practice but partially adhere to standard safety measures while administering intramuscular and intravenous injections. Whereas practice on standard safety measures while performing hand washing and aseptic wound dressing were less than average. Conclusion: The present study highlights the importance of in-service education on standard safety measures by incorporating new guidelines of nursing procedures based on evidence based practices. In-service education brought changes in the performance level as it is showed that the nursing personnel who had earlier received in-service education on Bio-medical waste management from the institute followed satisfactory waste disposal practice. Keywords: Standard safety measures, nursing personnel.