Not all docs/nurses want to be asked about hand hygiene
Although most health care workers appreciate the role of patients in preventing health care-associated infection, a considerable proportion are uncomfortable with patients asking about their hand hygiene, according to a letter published online Sept. 3 in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
(HealthDay)—Although most health care workers (HCWs) appreciate the role of patients in preventing health care-associated infection, a considerable proportion are uncomfortable with patients asking about their hand hygiene, according to a letter published online Sept. 3 in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
Yves Longtin, M.D., from the Infection Control Program and World Health Organization Collaborating Centre on Patient Safety in Geneva, and colleagues assessed HCWs' perceptions of a hypothetical patient participation program to improve staff compliance with hand hygiene. Two-hundred seventy-seven HCWs responded to an anonymous, confidential survey assessing attitudes and beliefs.
Forty-four percent of the respondents were physicians and 56 percent were nurses; 65 percent had more than 10 years' work experience. In the previous month, the researchers found that only 3 percent had been asked by a patient whether they had washed their hands before being cared for. Although nearly three-quarters (74 percent) believed that patients could help to prevent health care-associated infections, many HCWs did not support the idea of patients reminding them to perform hand hygiene (29 percent), and more than a third refused to wear a badge inviting patients to ask about hand hygiene (37 percent). Almost half (44 percent) admitted that if patients discovered they had omitted hand hygiene they would feel guilty, and 43 percent reported that they would be ashamed to admit having forgotten to wash their hands.
"This survey indicates that a nonnegligible proportion of HCWs do not endorse the concept of inviting patients to ask about hand hygiene," the authors conclude. "HCWs may prefer to keep patients in relative ignorance regarding appropriate hand hygiene behavior to avoid delicate situations."
More information: Full Text (subscription or payment may be required)
Journal reference:
JAMA Internal Medicine
Copyright © 2012 HealthDay. All rights reserved.
-
Latex gloves lead to lax hand hygiene in hospitals, study finds
Nov 03, 2011 |
not rated yet |
0
-
Studies shed light on hand hygiene knowledge and infection risk in hospitals and elementary schools
Aug 04, 2011 |
not rated yet |
0
-
Wash your hands and you may approach the patient bed
Mar 17, 2011 |
not rated yet |
0
-
Study reports predictors of poor hand hygiene in an emergency department
Oct 03, 2011 |
not rated yet |
0
-
Should researchers wash their hands of hand washing?
Apr 18, 2007 |
not rated yet |
0
-
Motion perception revisited: High Phi effect challenges established motion perception assumptions
Apr 23, 2013 |
3 / 5 (2) |
2
-
Anything you can do I can do better: Neuromolecular foundations of the superiority illusion (Update)
Apr 02, 2013 |
4.5 / 5 (11) |
5
-
The visual system as economist: Neural resource allocation in visual adaptation
Mar 30, 2013 |
5 / 5 (2) |
9
-
Separate lives: Neuronal and organismal lifespans decoupled
Mar 27, 2013 |
4.9 / 5 (8) |
0
-
Sizing things up: The evolutionary neurobiology of scale invariance
Feb 28, 2013 |
4.8 / 5 (10) |
14
-
Classical and Quantum Mechanics via Lie algebras
Apr 15, 2011
- More from Physics Forums - Independent Research
More news stories
Salt consumption in India: The need for data to initiate population-based prevention efforts
(Medical Xpress)—International researchers are studying the salt intake of Indian adults to provide vital new data to aid the development of a national salt reduction strategy.
Health
23 minutes ago |
not rated yet |
0
Holding drivers' attention
Each day, an average of nine people are killed in the United States and more than 1,000 injured by drivers doing something other than driving.
Health
38 minutes ago |
not rated yet |
0
Bed sharing with parents increases risk of cot death fivefold
Bed sharing with parents is linked to a fivefold increased risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), even when the parents are non-smokers and the mother has not been drinking alcohol and does not use illegal drugs, according ...
Health
12 hours ago |
1.3 / 5 (3) |
0
Many people with implantable defibrillators can participate in vigorous sports
Many people with implantable defibrillators can safely participate in vigorous sports according to new research in the American Heart Association journal Circulation.
Health
12 hours ago |
not rated yet |
0
Gym class reduces probability of obesity, study finds for first time
Little is known about the effect of physical education (PE) on child weight, but a new study from Cornell University finds that increasing the amount of time that elementary schoolchildren spent in gym class reduces the probability ...
Health
14 hours ago |
not rated yet |
0
Biomarker trio predicts near-term heart risk
(Medical Xpress)—Cardiologists have identified a trio of biomarkers that may predict which patients with heart disease have a high risk of heart attack or death in the next two years.
New theory offers clues to vital 'repair and maintenance' role of sleep
(Medical Xpress)—We spend about a third of our life asleep, but why we need to do so remains a mystery. In a recent publication, researchers at University of Surrey and University College London suggest a new hypothesis, ...
Eyes on the sun: Child sunshine exposure and eye development
(Medical Xpress)—Exposure to sunshine as a small child is crucial to the development of a healthy eye according to results of long-term myopia study conducted by University of Sydney researchers.
Genetic predictors of postpartum depression uncovered
Johns Hopkins researchers say they have discovered specific chemical alterations in two genes that, when present during pregnancy, reliably predict whether a woman will develop postpartum depression.
Study puts Huntington's disease trials on TRACK
(Medical Xpress)—A three-year multinational study has tracked and detailed the progression of Huntington's disease (HD), predicting clinical decline in people carrying the HD gene more than 10 years before ...
No new H7N9 cases in China for a week
No new human cases of the H7N9 virus have been recorded in China for a week, national health authorities said, for the first time since the outbreak began in March.