Nursing practice regarding prevention of hospital acquired infections in intensive care units at university teaching hospitals, Rwanda.

Abstract

Background: Hospital acquired infections (HAIs) is a major safety concern for both health care providers and the patients. It is a major cause of mortality and morbidity and provides challenge to clinicians. However; the measures of infection control including identifying patients at risk of nosocomial infections, observing hand hygiene, following standard precautions have been identified. Objectives: The aim of this study was to assess the nursing practices in prevention of hospital acquired infections while also evaluating various factors affecting those practices to minimize hospital acquired infections in intensive care unit at University Teaching Hospitals in Rwanda Methodology: Quantitative non-experimental approach was used in this study.The study population was made of 93 nurses working in adult or pediatric Intensive Care Units (ICUs) at three hospitals namely Kigali University Teaching Hospital, King Faisal Hospital and Butare University Teaching Hospital. A census sampling strategy was used for data collection. To achieve the study‟s objectives, the Infection Control Assessment Tool, a Standardized Approach for Improving Hospital Infection Control Practices was used as data collection tool. The tools were simplified and adapted to this study. The SPSS 21 was used to capture and analyze the data. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were applied to assess the associations among various variables. Results: Participants in this study were mainly young (mean age of 33 ± 3.8 years) and 61 (65,6%) of them were females. Most of them were married [63 (67.7%)], 2 (2.2%) cohabitant and 28 (30.1%) were single.Most of the participants [65.6%] had advanced diploma in nursing while holders of bachelor and master‟s degree were 31 (33.3%) and 1 (1.1%) respectively. In regression analysis, participants who had training on infection control had 4.1 times high score in the observed nursing practices compared to those who did not attend the training (OR=4.1, 95%CI=1.55-11.2 and p=0.004). Participants with experience of working in ICU of at least 6 years had 2.8 times high scores in nursing practice compared to those with less experience. The level of education was not associated with the observed nursing practice (OR=1.3, 95%CI=0.-53- 3.3, p=0.537). Male participants had 3.4 times of scoring high in observed nursing practice than female participants (OR=3.4, 95% CI= 1.2-9.5 and p=0.018). Nurses with age greater than 35 years had 3.6 times odds of scoring high in nursing practice compared to those with 35 years and less (OR=3.6, 95% CI=0.9-13.5, p=0.054). Conclusion: Training on infection control, work experience, age and male gender were associated with convenient nursing practice for infection control. The level of education is unlikely to influence this practices.