Attitude and practice of students of Holy Family Nursing And Midwifery Training College, Berekum towards hand hygiene

Abstract

The study focused on the attitude and practice of hand hygiene among Nursing and Midwifery students at Holy Family Nursing and Midwifery Training College, Berekum. A descriptive study design was used to collect in-depth information for the study. The sample population was obtained using a convenient sampling technique. A total of 40 students were sampled for the study. The data for the study was collected by administering the questionnaire to the participants. The study found that all of the respondents had good knowledge of proper hand hygiene. The majority of the respondents (95%) believed that artificial fingernails could increase the likelihood of colonization of hands with harmful germs. The majority of the respondents (90%) agreed that hand hygiene should be performed in sequence. The majority of the respondents (60%) agreed that hand rubbing causes skin dryness more than handwashing. Most of the respondents (60%) agreed that insufficient time for hand hygiene hinders student nurses to perform appropriate hand hygiene according to the recommended guidelines. Eighty percent (80%) of the respondents agreed that hand hygiene is an essential part of their role. The majority of the respondents (77.5%) agreed that they advise others to abide by the rules of hand hygiene. The study recommended that artificial fingernails should not be worn by student nurses and natural ones should also be kept short because it could increase the likelihood of colonization of hands with harmful germs, hand hygiene posters and literature should be placed at vantage points to help students to perform hand hygiene in proper sequence, student nurses should be encouraged to use the easiest form of hand hygiene when they do not have enough time to perform them, students should also be encouraged to remind others to perform hand hygiene when they forget and there should be rewards for compliance and punishments for noncompliance to hand hygiene protocols.