Premium
Nurses' views of infection control: an interview study
Author(s) -
Gould Dinah,
Ream Emma
Publication year - 1994
Publication title -
journal of advanced nursing
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.948
H-Index - 155
eISSN - 1365-2648
pISSN - 0309-2402
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2648.1994.tb01196.x
Subject(s) - checklist , infection control , economic shortage , medicine , specialty , universal precautions , infection risk , intensive care unit , nursing , risk of infection , medline , nursing staff , infection rate , medical emergency , family medicine , psychology , emergency medicine , intensive care medicine , surgery , human immunodeficiency virus (hiv) , government (linguistics) , biology , political science , law , cognitive psychology , genetics , linguistics , philosophy
An interview study was conducted among 173 nurses in two hospitals to explore their views concerning infection risks to themselves and patients and to identify any problems they perceived in safely performing infection control precautions during routine activities. Subjects were interested in the topic of Infection control and keen to perform optimally, but perceived difficulties related to lack of expert guidance whether or not they had access to an infection control nurse. In one hospital subjects identified shortages of vital equipment (gloves, appropriate handwashing agents), and this was corroborated on a checklist used independently to document the availability of resources. When the opinions of nurses working in intensive care, surgical and medical units were compared, few differences emerged other than those explained by variation in supplies of equipment, except that intensive care unit nurses were more likely to rate their patients and themselves as particularly at risk of infection, Nurses who had been qualified longer, with more than 3 years experience in their speciality, were more conscious of infection risks.