How Much Do Medical Students Know about Infection Control - Research Paper Example

Appraisal of the article How much do medical know about infection control Taking good care of the hygiene aspects is very important for hospitals in particular and the health industry in general. This helps not only in taking on the competition as the hospital is counted as adhering to quality standards, but it also infuses confidence amongst the consumers of hospital services. The medical fraternity including doctors and other support staff are supposed to take adequate precaution while dealing with infection related issues. Infection control is considered a topical issue amongst the practitioners and the media. When the poor hygiene issues of a hospital are highlighted by the media, it results in drop in its credibility and patients try their best not to utilise the services of such hospitals. Therefore hospitals and medical training institutions try to impart the basic training to all of it employees and students so that they could help in keeping infection at bay. This article is an effort to fathom the levels of awareness amongst the third year medical students at the University of Birmingham Medical School, UK on infection control policy and procedures. The fact that the students were all from third year implies they'd gone through the studies and were supposed to know the ill effects of using infected items and how to take adequate precaution in order to make the lives safe and secure. The study doesn't have any direct commercial motive and is meant mainly for the academic interest. In any case once the students, with appreciable levels of infection control, enter into the industry, they are bound to prove an asset for the organisation they join. The study has mainly focused on six key principles of infection control as standardised by the Epic Project. Using a non-weighted marking system, the student's awareness levels were assessed basically on six key areas of; Washing hands or use of alcohol gel Colour of clinical waste bags Use of gloves Correct procedure for disposal of contaminated sharps Correct procedures during venipuncture Needle-stick injuries The literature review part appears to be a weaker part of the study, as the researcher has not made much effort to highlight the ill-effects of ignoring the infection control aspects. Data available within the country, the industry or from reputed international bodies might have provided a base for the study. Outcomes of similar studies in the past could have also been highlighted here. But it appears the research team has tried to compensate the lack of literature review by making the data collection and analysis process more comprehensive. To this end a sample size of 322 students was considered by the research team. But, it appears somewhat strange that if the questionnaires were handed over to the students during the compulsory class, and the questionnaires were taken back duly filled up during the same class, then how come the return percentage is so low i.e. only 156 out of 322 students i.e. just 48% of the students returned the questionnaires! This is a gross inefficiency on the part of the research team. Either, they could not convince the students about the usefulness of taking part in such an exercise or the questionnaire was designed in such a manner that it put the students off, or perhaps the language or design of the questionnaire was so complicated that students were not able to understand it properly. For a research to be successful, the data gathering process happens to be the most important part. Before distributing the questionnaires, a small presentation is made by the researcher making the research participants aware about the aims and objectives of the study, and how the students themselves, the institutions and the society will benefit from it. In fact if it would've been emphasized on the students that responding to the questionnaire would help in assessing and improving their own performances, things might've somewhat different. Though the number of returned questionnaires was 156, which is a good number in totality, but the fact that it is just 48 percent of the total sample size, raises question marks on the efficiency of the data collection process. The data analysis part appears to have been done quite comprehensively though. Standard Deviations (SD) and 95 percent confidence intervals (95 percent CI) were used for the analysis. Another reputed data analysis tool, Chi-squared test with Yates' correction was used for testing of associations in nominal data. Similarly for testing the associations in continuous data the research team has used one-way analysis of variance. In addition to figure out the statistical difference in the different between two group's means was found out using Student's t-test. Therefore, it is quite apparent that the research team has tried its level best to find out all possible reliable outcomes from the collected data. The outcomes of the study appear to be quite though provoking; the lower levels of awareness about infection control amongst the students, that too amongst the third-year students is perhaps an indication for the educational institutions, the industry and the government agencies to join hands and come out with an effective mechanism to deal with such issues. The fact that about half of the students have pointed out towards inadequacies in the teaching pattern for infection control makes the issue all the more important for all us to ponder over. The concluding part of the study appears rather defensive. Though it has come out with quite comprehensive numbers yet, no suggestions are made by the researcher on how to make the infection control knowledge more effective. Generally, a good research is supposed to advance some suggestions, some pointed directions to be taken so that the study helps in advancing the cause taken up by the study. But in this case the researcher duo of C.M. Manna and A. Wood has just spelt out the findings. In conclusion, providing medical students with knowledge and ensuring that they acquire the correct practical skills in infection control is important. The approach within the medical school in this study left it unclear about how this would happen. The chance to ensure that the correct importance is given to infection control for now and the future is thus lost. All medical schools need to be sure that they have the correct programme and assessment procedures in place to ensure that knowledge on safe practice is taught and retained, and that appropriate behaviour becomes the norm rather than the exception. Read More