The durability of examination gloves used on intensive care units (original) (raw)
American Journal of Infection Control, 2006
Background: Hospital-acquired infection often occurs because of lapses in accepted standards of practice on the part of health care personnel. The aim of this study is to attract attention on poor hospital infection control practice in venepuncture and use of tourniquets and emphasize the importance of hand hygiene. Methods: Overall compliance with hygiene during usage of tourniquets and routine patient care before and after implementation of a hospital infection control measures was evaluated. Results: According to the questionnaire, only 26.9% of respondents always washed their hands both before and after venepuncture. In the second step of the study, based on direct observation, hands were washed both before and after venepuncture on only 41 (45.1%) occasions. Failure to remove gloves after patient contact was observed on 23.1% occasions. Conclusion: Our survey reveals poor infection control practice in hand hygiene, glove utilization, and usage of tourniquets and the implementation of infection control measures produced a moderate improvement in compliance with them.
Infection, 2009
Background: The Hand Hygiene Liaison Group and Epic Projects (Pratt et al., J Hosp Infect 47[Suppl A], 2001) have asked specifically for further trials of educational interventions to improve hand decontamination compliance and infection control in the hospital setting. This study investigates the efficacy of a 'clean practice protocol' (CPP), derived from international guidelines, to improve compliance of infection-control practices by surgical teams in a large UK teaching hospital. Methods: The key infection-control activities were summated to form the CPP presented here. An undisclosed infection-control audit of consultant-led ward-rounds from breast, gastrointestinal, vascular, urological, and intensivecare departments was performed. The audit results were presented to the surgical teams, after which an education/ awareness program was implemented. A repeat undisclosed audit was performed 3 months later. In both audits, infection-control activities were recorded together with consultation time and any patient infective complications. Results: The surgical teams performed as follows in the initial audit: hand decontamination (28% of consultations), correct use of gloves (2%), instrument cleaning (0%), garment contamination (49%), and notes contamination (34%). Introduction of the CPP education program significantly improved hand decontamination to 87% (p < 0.0001), the correct use of gloves/aprons to 50% (p < 0.0001), and overall infection-control practice from 63% to 89% (p < 0.05). Conclusions: The introduction of the CPP significantly improved compliance of hand decontamination, correct usage of gloves and aprons, and overall infection-control in a large teaching hospital. The CPP is a highly effective auditing and educational tool that can be readily adapted for use in hospitals globally to monitor and improve infection-control practices.
Providing care to patients in contact isolation: is the systematic use of gloves still indicated?
Swiss Medical Weekly, 2021
This article reviews the available evidence on the effectiveness of gloves in preventing infection during care provided to patients under contact precautions, and analyses the risks and benefits of their systematic use. Although hand hygiene with alcohol-based handrub was shown to be effective in preventing nosocomial infections, many publications put the effectiveness and usefulness of gloves into perspective. Instead, literature and various unpublished experiences point towards reduced hand hygiene compliance and increased risk of spreading pathogens with routine glove use. Therefore, hospitals should emphasise hand hygiene in their healthcare staff and, instead of the routine use of gloves when caring for patients under contact precautions, limit their use to the indications of standard precautions, i.e., mainly for contact with body fluids. Wide and easy access to alcohol-based handrub and continual teaching are essential. If such conditions are met and adherence to hand hygiene...
Effect of Glove Decontamination on Bacterial Contamination of Healthcare Personnel Hands
Clinical Infectious Diseases, 2019
We examined the effect of glove decontamination prior to removal on bacterial contamination of healthcare personnel hands in a laboratory simulation study. Glove decontamination reduced bacterial contamination of hands following removal. However, hand contamination still occurred with all decontamination methods, reinforcing the need for hand hygiene following glove removal.
Texto & Contexto - Enfermagem, 2016
The objectives of this study were to identify the types of gloves the nursing team uses for the manual cleaning of health products and to identify the perforation rates in procedure/surgical gloves used for this purpose. Cross-sectional and descriptive, descriptive study with quantitative approach was developed at a large hospital in Goiânia, Goiás, Brazil. In total, 300 procedure/surgical gloves (Group A), 100 procedure and 100 new surgical gloves (Group B), and six nitrile gloves (Group C) were analyzed. Among the gloves in Group A, 135 (45.0%) were perforated. Superposition of gloves did not prevent perforations and, the longer they were used, the higher the index of perforation (p<0.05). No perforations were identified in Group B, whereas there were four perforations in 48 hours of use in Group C. This study reinforces the idea that procedure/surgical gloves are inappropriate for cleaning health products, representing an ineffective barrier for the safety of workers.
Hand contamination during routine care in medical wards: the role of hand hygiene compliance
Journal of Medical Microbiology, 2013
The hands of healthcare workers (HCWs) are the most common vehicle for the transmission of microorganisms from patient to patient and within the healthcare environment. The aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of a multimodal campaign on the type and amount of resident and transient flora and the presence of potential risk factors for hand contamination during routine care. A before-after (PRE and POST periods) interventional study was carried out in medical wards of a tertiary care hospital. Eighty-nine samples were analysed. Samples were cultured immediately before patient contact using a glove-juice method. Data collected included sociodemographic and risk factors for hand contamination. Flora was measured as log 10 c.f.u. ml "1 and evaluated by comparing median values in the PRE and POST periods. Transient flora was isolated from the hands of 67.4 and 46.1 % of HCWs in the PRE and POST periods, respectively (P,0.001). Enterobacteriaceae, Pseudomonas spp. and meticillin-sensitive Staphylococcus aureus were the predominant contaminants. Resident flora was isolated from 92.1 % of HCWs in the PRE period and from 70.8 % in the POST period (P,0.001). The meticillin-resistant coagulase-negative staphylococci log 10 c.f.u. count ml "1 decreased from 1.96±1.2 to 0.89±1.2 (mean±SD; P,0.001), and the global flora count decreased from 2.77±1.1 to 1.56±1.4 (P,0.001). In the POST period, the wearing of fewer rings (P,0.001), shorter fingernail length (P50.008), a shorter time since recent hand hygiene (HH) (P50.007) and an increased use of alcohol-based hand rub instead of soap (P,0.001) were documented. The HH multimodal strategy reduced the number of risk factors and the level of HCW hand contamination.
Hand Hygiene Analyzed by Video Recording
Objective : The aim of this study is to evaluate the hand hygiene and isolation precaution adhesion of the healthcare workers in routine cares. Methods : In an infectious diseases care unit of a university hospital in Marseille, France, we designed an observational study at evaluating the hand hygiene and isolation precaution adhesion of the healthcare workers in routine cares by remote video recording. The care team including nurses, assistant nurses, housekeepers and physicians was monitored from November 30 th (2012) to February 13 th (2013). From a video camera was placed inside patient room, healthcare workers paths were recorded from entrance to exit of the patient's room. Hand hygiene disinfection as well as gloves and mask wearing in isolation precautions were observed. A video camera was placed inside patient room. Healthcare workers paths were recorded from entrance to exit of the patient's room. A nurse and a sociologist analyzed further videos. Hand hygiene disinfection as well as gloves and mask wearing in isolation precaution were observed. Results : A total of 756 videos were captures. 249 were rejected because they were not contributive and 507 videos (811 Healthcare workers paths) were analyzed. Healthcare workers had hand disinfection at least one time in the path in 28.2%. Hand disinfection at entrance and exit of the bedroom is respected in 6.2%. The meal tray delivery is associated with a lower hand hygiene practice. The glove wearing adhesion is 51.2% in Clostridium difficile contact precaution, and conformity to protocol is 17.5%. Wearing gloves impairs hand disinfection especially in situation where gloves are not part of the protocol (38.7%). Adhesion to mask wearing in airborne precaution is 90.7%.