Behavioral Determinants of Hand Hygiene Compliance in Intensive Care Units - Assignment Example

Undergraduate Learning Profile Name Subject: Instructor: April 7th, 2014. Reflection Paper This Undergraduate Learning Profile has assisted me overcome my fright of technology. Before, I was unsure of myself, but I swiftly got used to bulletin boards and email. My learning strength has been my ability to be disciplined enough and ability to set my goals and to attain those goals within a specific timeframe. I had my small note book, and each day I wrote down the things I needed to accomplish in every class. I also did break the tasks that appeared longer into smaller components. Each day I had to do something to attain my goal. The class has really taught me to be an organized person. Being an organized will greatly assist me both at work and in college by ensuring that everything is done the way it is required, in a timely and presentable manner. My weakness if I may say is fearing to ask for, and as this class progressed I suppressed that timideness in me. I noticed that in we all each the help of one another because we cannot solve all our problems by ourselves. I have noted that team work is important to succeed in what I do. The team project that we undertook greatly helped become knowledgeable on how to effectively participate in team work. This skill will significantly help me when I get a job as a nurse, which my main goal. This reflection has highlighted me certain aspects that require attention. Focusing of these areas and changing them will certainly enhance my learning capabilities. (Words 232). Part B: Student Interview In an interview I conducted with an experienced student (Ali), I asked him a number of questions such as why did you decide to do nursing course? Which subject/s are you good at? What supplementary subject or reading materials to you very helpful? Do you think is it good idea to establish rapport with other students? How did you handle social and academic life at the university? After the interview I thanked Ali for accepting me to interview him. From my interview with Ali, I learned a couple of ideas of how to stay focused in my studies and how my fellow students could be of greater help, one such idea was to ask be a well-rounded person who focuses on studies and sparing some time exercise. This helped me a lot because I had never considered doing exercise before. I realized that to doing exercise is good for my learning because it makes active and attentive in class. Interviewing Ali also helped me gain confidence in subjects that I almost gave up in. He gave hits on how to improve on the subject such as ask questions often, and by simply having the right attitude I have developed a lot of interest in the subject and my grades have significantly improved. (Words 212) Part C: Academic Writing Thesis Statement The impact of undergraduate hand hygiene assessment and education on healthcare students’ hand hygiene practices, beliefs and knowledge is at the moment understood poorly. Context The author was registered as a nurse in 1983, and primarily working at the ICU as a Clinical Specialist Nurse. Working at the ICU setting inspired an interest regarding the infection control and hand hygiene as ICU patients are highly vulnerable to hospital-acquired illnesses compared to patients from general hospital, and there is more mortality related to septic shock within the ICU setting. Main Points Hand washing is viewed to be a critical infection control mechanism within healthcare settings. The compliance of the recommended hand washing guidelines is low. The impact of undergraduate hand washing and assessment on practices, beliefs and knowledge of healthcare students of various discourses has gotten minimal attention. Paragraph Hand washing is considered a significant infection control approach within health care environment. Hand washing procedures for health care environs were devised in 1975 by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and since then have been updated and revised a number of occasions, latest in 2002 as Richards & Russo (2007) point out. In spite of some evidence that hand hygiene minimizes the occurrences of hospital-acquired illnesses and the associated mortality and costs, the compliance of health care staff with the prescribed hand hygiene requirements is poor. Significant time and resources have been consumed examining the elements that influence the health care workers’ compliance within health care set ups, and a various processes have been put in place to enhance hand hygiene compliance, most of the time with little success (Whitby, McLaws, & Ross, 2006). According McLaws, Pantle, Fitzpatrick & Hughes (2000), studies have demonstrated repeatedly that compliance by health workers (nurses) is greater than those of physicians. (Words 160)  References McLaws, M. L., Pantle, A. C., Fitzpatrick, K. R., & Hughes, C. (2009). Improvements  in  hand  hygiene  across  New  South  Wales  public  hospitals:  Clean  hands save lives, Part III.  Medical Journal of Australia, 191(8), S18-S25.  Richards, M. J., & Russo, P. L. (2007). Surveillance of hospital-acquired infections in Australia-  one  nation,  many  states.  Journal  of  Hospital  Infection,  65(Supplement 2), 174-181.  Whitby, M., McLaws, M. L., & Ross, M. W. (2006). Why health care workers don't wash their h ands: a behavioural explanation. Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology, 27(5), 484- 492 Section D: Article Selection and Evaluation David, W., Lea., M and Carine, V, (2010). Behavioral Determinants of hand hygiene Compliance in Intensive Care Units. American Journal of Critical Care. Volume 19. No. 3. Article Summary The objective of this article was to describe and identity determinants and predictors of noncompliance with hand washing prescriptions among nurses working at the Intensive Care Unit by way of questionnaire. A questionnaire constructed from the behavioral model theory was completed by 148 ICU nurses working at a 40-bed capacity ICU of a university hospital. The participants were requested to complete a questionnaire that had 56 items two times within a period between 2 to 6 weeks. In the course of this period, there was no hand washing intervention enforcement that took place in the unit. The rate of response for the test was (108/148), which translated to 73%; the rate of response for the retest was (57/108), equivalent to 53%. The mean rate of self-reported compliance was 84%. Factor scrutiny established 8 primary factors possibly linked to compliance. The study accepted the internal consistency of scales. There was low intraclass correlation (0.60) for the six sub-scales. A low self-efficacy was established to be independently linked to non-compliance (P =.001; * = .379). A negative attitude toward time-linked barriers was related to compliance, upon exclusion of this variable (P Read More