CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Infection control is a part of healthcare delivery that focuses on preventing infection spread inside the healthcare setting, whether it’s from patient to patient, patient to staff, staff to patients, or staff to staff. The following are the components of infection prevention and control, according to the World Health Organization (WHO, 2011): organization, technical guidelines, human resources, surveillance, microbiology laboratory assistance, environment, assessment, and ties with public health and other services. Setting up a program, forming an infection control committee, and assembling an inter-professional team, which should include physicians, nurses, microbiologists, epidemiologists, infection control specialists, information specialists, and others, is all part of the organization process.
Because their work requires collaboration with other departments, staff, and programs, the committee must have a solid working relationship with one another. Technical recommendations entail the creation, dissemination, and implementation of technical evidence-based information for the prevention of infection hazards. The training and retraining of health care personnel in infection prevention, as well as the training of infection control professionals, are all part of human resources. It ensures that there is a sufficient number of people in charge of infection prevention and control.
Surveillance is the monitoring of infection spread that has been observed or suspected. It entails gathering epidemiological data and detecting outbreaks, as well as assessing levels of infection control compliance, responding to outbreaks, and documenting the state of healthcare-associated infection. Surveillance is critical because it allows for early detection, identification, isolation, and intervention, as well as infection prevention. The microbiology laboratory assists in the generation of data, the standardization of laboratory techniques, and the interaction of infection control activities. The term “environment” refers to the bare minimum of infection control requirements. Water, ventilation, hand-hygiene equipment, patient placement and isolation facilities, sterile supply storage, building conditions, and renovation activities are all included. Monitoring, assessing, and reporting infection prevention and control outcomes, as well as processing and strategizing at the national and local levels, are all part of evaluation. It reflects the impact of infection-prevention programs. Infections can come from a variety of places. Healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) are infections that arise during the course of treatment and cause the patient’s illness to worsen, possibly leading to death. They also lengthen hospital stays and necessitate additional interventions at a cost in addition to the one incurred by the patient’s initial illness. Its occurrence is a sign of poor patient care, an adverse event, and a concern for patient safety. Adverse drug events, surgical complications, microorganism isolates, antimicrobial resistance, decreasing trends in intensive care units, exogenous microorganisms such as bacteria, fungi, viruses, and protozoan from other patients, endogenous flora of the patients-residual bacteria residing on the patient’s skin, mucous membranes, gastro intestinal tract, and respiratory tract are some of the sources. Healthcare workers are at risk of infection because they come into contact with infected tissues, fluids, blood, and blood products on a regular basis. In order to prevent the spread of infectious diseases such as hepatitis B and C, the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), and other life-threatening infections, several infection control measures have been implemented. Furthermore, hospital waste is a potential source of infection, necessitating the implementation of effective infection control measures. It has been discovered that healthcare personnel do not strictly adhere to various infection control measures, most likely because they do not recognize them or lack adequate information, or because of a poor attitude toward infection control measures, such as the absence of materials and equipment (Amoran & Onwube, 2013). In 1996, the US Centers for Disease Prevention and Prevention (CDC) proposed standard precautions as an infection control measure. Many diseases, such as occupational pathogen exposure, can be avoided by following conventional measures. While some health care personnel are aware of infection control procedures, others are not. This could be due to a lack of awareness or understanding, and some people who are familiar with infection control procedures have a negative attitude about practice. When you consider how important it is for healthcare personnel to have proper understanding and practice of infection control procedures, you can’t help but wonder what can be done to increase that knowledge and practice. I, Jain, Dogra, Mishra, Thakur, and Loomba (2012)
STATEMENT OF PROBLEM
Infection is a risk for healthcare workers in general. According to WHO (2006), over 3 million health professionals worldwide are exposed to bloodborne viruses percutaneously each year, including 2 million to Hepatitis B virus (HBV), 0.9 million to Hepatitis C virus (HCV), and 170,000 to Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) (HIV). 70,000 HBV, 15,000 HCV, and 5,000 HIV infections are possible as a result of these injuries. If infection control procedures are not carefully maintained, nurses are more likely to become infected with blood-borne pathogens from clinical blood exposure through accidents with sharp instruments and needle-stick injuries.
This is due to the fact that they are frequently the initial point of contact for a patient when they arrive at the hospital and provide round-the-clock care. Clinical nurses have also been shown to be infected as a result of occupational exposure, according to studies (Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, 2012). In their study of health workers in North Eastern Nigeria, Abdulraheem, Amodu, Saka, Bolarinwa, and Uthman (2012) discovered that the degree of awareness and implementation of standard precautions is below norm to ensure infection safety. They came to the conclusion that there is still a lot to learn and apply in terms of infection control.
Furthermore, the study discovered that certain nurses in various health institutions do not follow the components of basic safeguards when giving nursing care. For example, after removing gloves and before starting another surgery, a few nurses were witnessed not washing their hands. Liquid soap is not provided in some of the outpatient department’s wash hand basins for health personnel and patients to wash their hands. When blood or bodily fluids spill on the floor, housekeepers do not disinfect with hypochlorite solution before mopping with soap and water. Infection control units at health care facilities are not sufficiently equipped to ensure that standard procedures are followed. In view of the inadequacies, the researcher became interested in designing a training program for nurses at Babcock University Teaching Hospital (BUTH), Ilisan-Remo, Ogun, on knowledge, perception, attitude, and practice of infection control.
OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
The major goal of this research is to see how a training program affects infection control among nurses. The following are the precise goals:
evaluate the impact of the training program on participants’ understanding of
infection prevention;
determine the impact of the training program on participants’ perceptions
concerning infection prevention;
document the impact of the training program on participants’ attitudes
towards infection control;
implement a training programme on infection control; determine the level of skills possessed and practice of participants on infection control; assess the effectiveness of a training programme on infection risk reduction and ascertain if there is any difference between the self-reported practices and the actual
observed practices of infection control in the experimental group.
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
The following research questions were intended to be answered in this study:
What impact does the training program have on participants’ attitudes? What impact does the training program have on the participants’ perceptions? What impact does the training program have on the participants’ knowledge? What is the impact of the training program on the reduction of infection risk?
SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The training program’s importance to nurses, patients, the hospital, and society cannot be overstated. Nurses’ infection control practices may improve as a result of the training program. Hand cleaning, donning and removing PPE like as gloves, gowns, masks, and eyewear, and injection safety are among the practices. The research could also help nurses learn more about the components of routine precautions. Nurses may feel more protected from HIV and Hepatitis exposures as a result of their training and use of conventional safeguards, making them more willing to provide better “physical care.”
Nurses are also less afraid of patients and less judgmental of them, making them less likely to stigmatize or discriminate them, resulting in better “psychosocial or emotional care” when caring for patients with highly infectious disorders.
Standard precautions presuppose that all patients are potential sources of infection and that they must be treated properly in this regard. The hospital benefits from this program because the patients who receive care are less likely to contract a nosocomial infection. As a result, the hospital may gain recognition, attracting more patronage from Ogun state residents and beyond.
SCOPE OF THE STUDY
The knowledge, attitude, perception, and practice of infection control among nurses were examined in this study. Hand hygiene, the use of personal protective equipment (PPE), the proper handling of sharps/injections, cleaning and disinfection, and waste management are all examples of specific areas. The training package is the independent variable, whereas the participants’ knowledge, attitude, perception, and practice are the dependent variables.
RESEARCH HYPOTHESIS
These three hypotheses were tested at a significance level of 0.05:
Ho 1. There is no statistically significant difference between the experimental and control groups in terms of infection control knowledge.
Ho 2. There is no statistically significant difference in the mean infection control practice score between the experimental and control groups.
Ho 3. In the experimental group, there is no significant difference between self-reported and observed infection control practices.
Leave a Comment