Hand Areas Which Are Commonly Missed during Hand Disinfection by Nursing Students Who Completed a Basic Educational Course in Hand Hygiene

Consensus statement on the prevention, diagnosis, and management of infection following transcutaneous osseointegration for patients with limb loss: current state-of-the-art and proposed future studies

The diagnosis, risk factors, treatment algorithms, and long-term sequelae of superficial and deep, implant-related infections in transdermal, bone-anchored osseointegration are not well-defined. In contrast to the robust experience diagnosing and managing periprosthetic joint infections in total joint arthroplasty, osseointegration surgery has only recently been adopted at a small number of osseointegration centers in the United States, contributing to the lack of long-term outcomes. Through the pooled experience from these osseointegration centers, we present a consensus statement on the perioperative management, incidence, treatment, and diagnostic workup for infectious complications following transdermal, bone-anchored osseointegration.

Knowledge of hand hygiene and evaluation of hand washing technique among nurses at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital

BACKGROUND

Healthcare worker's hands are route for cross-transmission of potentially harmful germs between patients in a healthcare facility. As hand washing is an established cost-effective measure for infection control, hand hygiene knowledge and compliance with the recommended steps are essential to control healthcare-associated infections (HCAI). We assessed the knowledge and practice of hand hygiene among nurses at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH), Enugu.

METHODS

A cross-sectional study was carried out from 14th September to 24th December 2023 on all consenting nurses in UNTH. A modified World Health Organization (WHO) knowledge questionnaire structured to collect demographics and assess hand hygiene knowledge expressed as good(> 75%), moderately good(50-74%) and poor(< 50%) knowledge. Duration to completion of hand washing was timed while Glo germ gel with ultraviolet lamp were used to assess effectiveness of hand washing. Ineffective hand washing was graded as fair, poor, or very poor. The WHO checklist was used to assess steps in hand washing technique performed.

RESULT

A total of 395 nurses participated in the study (mean age and standard deviation, 41.40 ± 8.82 years). Most were females (93.2%), married (80.8%), and functioned in the surgery department (38.5%). Moderately good knowledge of hand hygiene was demonstrated by 58.2% while effective hand washing occurred in 29.2% of them. Steps of hand washing technique most frequently missed were the use of towel to turn off faucet (94.3%), rubbing backs of fingers to opposing palms with fingers interlocked (89.8%), and wetting hands with water before applying soap(55.9%). Zones of hands not adequately washed were mainly the fingernails and perimeter of fingernails (38.4%), the palm (28.6%), and the dorsum of hand (22.9%). There was no significant difference in hand hygiene knowledge and effective hand washing across the different age groups, sex, nursing cadre, educational qualifications, and departments.

CONCLUSION

Nurses at the UNTH had fair hand hygiene knowledge with the majority demonstrating ineffective hand washing; a finding suggesting sub-optimal infection prevention and control. Periodic hand hygiene training targeting nurses and other health personnel engaged in patient care while emphasizing frequently missed areas is paramount to improving hand hygiene knowledge and effectiveness.

CLINICAL TRIAL NUMBER

Not applicable.

Medical Students' and Radiology Technician Trainees' eHealth Literacy and Hygiene Awareness-Asynchronous and Synchronous Digital Hand Hygiene Training in a Single-Center Trial

Next to the known nosocomial infections, the COVID-19 pandemic was an example for the need for the immediate implementation of functioning hygiene concepts and knowledge transfer. The aim of this study was to evaluate the self-assessment of ehealth literacy in terms of finding, using and critically evaluating health information and theoretical and practical hygiene awareness on a voluntary participation basis at the Jena University Hospital in 2022. The well-established and validated eHEALS and WHO questionnaire on hand hygiene (HH) knowledge for healthcare workers was completely filled by 204 participants (191 medical students; 13 healthcare trainees). In a second step, after the questionnaire, 77 participants completed additional asynchronous, digitally guided self-training using DesiCoach 2Go. In the end, a synchronous hand disinfection was carried out in the hospital using Visirub, by separating it into a group without (n = 191; with and without HH questionnaire) and a group with (n = 31; with HH questionnaire) previously completed self-training. For the eHL, the respondents tended to have a positive self-assessment of finding, using and critically evaluating health information. The voluntary participants of the practical hand disinfection who had received self-training were able to achieve significantly better results (p = 0.0047), resulting in fewer wetting gaps in a subsequent performance with Visirub than those who had not received digital self-training. The survey showed that healthcare-related participants belonging to the "digital native" generation have above-average knowledge on HH and profit by digitally guided self-training.

Review of literature: Knowledge and practice of standard precautions by nursing student and teaching techniques used in training

INTRODUCTION

Standard precautions (SP) help to combat healthcare-associated infections. It is of paramount importance that they be taught during nursing studies. The objective of this review of the literature was to determine the level of knowledge and practice of SP and hand hygiene (HH) of nursing students (NSs) and to identify the different pedagogical hygiene techniques applied in nursing training.

METHODS

A review of the relevant literature was carried out according to the PRISMA method between January 2010 and April 2021.

RESULTS

Eighty-one articles were selected: 36 studies were dedicated to NSs' knowledge, 43 to the SP practice of NSs, and 21 to hygiene teaching techniques in nursing training. While NSs knowledge of HH was found to be moderate, their knowledge of SP was moderate or good. Alcohol-based hand rub were little known. SP practice and compliance with SP and HH was moderate. The hygiene training programs set up in view of improving knowledge and practices have applied diversified pedagogical techniques. Multimodal approaches have proposed different associations of pedagogical techniques. As of now, no single teaching methods has been found clearly superior to the others.

CONCLUSION

Enhanced training for nurses by means of new technologies and a combination of different approaches is indispensable in view of improving their levels of knowledge and practice.