Premium
Hand hygiene with alcohol hand rub and gloves reduces the incidence of late onset sepsis in preterm neonates
Author(s) -
Janota Jan,
Šebková Sylva,
Višňovská Magda,
Kudláčková Jana,
Hamplová Drahomíra,
Zach Jiří
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
acta paediatrica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.772
H-Index - 115
eISSN - 1651-2227
pISSN - 0803-5253
DOI - 10.1111/apa.12731
Subject(s) - medicine , incidence (geometry) , hygiene , sepsis , gestation , neonatal intensive care unit , pediatrics , surgery , pregnancy , physics , pathology , biology , optics , genetics
Aim To assess the impact of a hand hygiene protocol, using hand washing, alcohol hand rub and gloves when caring for preterm infants born after 31 weeks of gestation, on the incidence of neonatal late onset sepsis ( LOS ). Methods All babies delivered between 32 + 0 and 36 + 6 weeks gestation and admitted to the neonatal intensive care unit during a 14‐month period were included. We followed a hand hygiene protocol with hand washing and alcohol hand rub (hand rub period) for the first 7 months and a protocol of hand washing, alcohol hand rub and gloves (gloves period) for the second 7 months. The hand rub and gloves groups consisted of 111 and 89 patients, respectively. Results Five patients were diagnosed with a total of six episodes of LOS in the hand rub group, and the incidence of LOS during the hand rub period was 2.99/1000 hospital days and 54.1/1000 admissions. There were no patients diagnosed with LOS during the gloves period (significant decrease, p = 0.028). Conclusion Using a hand hygiene protocol with hand washing, hand rub and gloves significantly reduced the incidence of LOS in preterm newborns, and the results suggest that it may produce a sustained improvement in the infection rate.