Hand hygiene

perception of nursing students’ attitudes

Abstract

Introduction

The Hand hygiene set according to the Basic Safety Precautions contributes to the prevention and control of the infections associated with health care and it aims to improve constantly its quality.

It is a well-known practice that contributes to the reduction of morbidity and mortality of patients. Nursing students, in the context of clinical practice, should have the perception of the importance of this practice in health care assistance.

Objective

To evaluate the perception of nursing students' attitudes according to the importance of hand hygiene; To determine whether the sociodemographic variables and the level of knowledge may influence the perception of the students when it deals with hand hygiene.

Methods

It was carried out a cross-sectional, descriptive and correlational quantitative study, which involved 258 nursing students, aged between 19 and 45 years (21:39 ± 2.490).

For the measurement of the variables it was used a socio- demographic and family characteristics form and to the perception of attitudes as well as the hand hygiene assessment it was produced a questionnaire based on the guidelines by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Results

46.1% of the students under survey still live with their parents or family. Most of them (51.9%) do not have a family member related to health services. According to their hand hygiene attention, 76% consider it appropriate. They mention hand hygiene performing the five recommended moments. The perception of students about these attitudes is influenced only by the level of knowledge on the importance of hand hygiene (X² = 21,196, p = 0.000) they have.

Conclusions

The perception of the students' attitudes is important because it allows developing a greater awareness on the subject which leads to behavioral changes in the practice of hand hygiene. The Nursing Course plan of studies is particularly important once it leads to a greater compliance referring to these practices which will affect the improvement of the nursing care.