Defining the knowledge level and applications related to hospital infections, of the hospital staff in, intensive care units

This study was performed to define the knowledge level and applicationsrelated to hospital infections, of the hospital staff in Akdeniz University Faculty ofMedicine, Research and Administration Hospital Intensive Care Units.Seventy assistant doctors, 75 nurses, and 33 helper health care attendantsemployed in Akdeniz University Faculty of Medicine, Research and AdministrationHospital, Intensive Care Units, were included in the study.The data were collected with three separate questionnaire documentsdeveloped for the three groups of personnel. The first part of the questonnairedocuments included the descriptive features of the personnel, whereas the secondpart included questions related to evaluation of knowledge and applications related toprevention of spread of hospital infections, in the hospital section. To determine theefficiency of the data collection method, a preliminary application was carried outwith 10 assistant doctors, 10 nurses, and 10 helper health care attendants.The questionnaire forms were applied separately to each assistant doctor,nurse, and helper health care attendant in each shift to minimize interaction, inbetween the dates of 01.03.2005 and 30.03.3005. The application was performed byone pollster and one investigator.The data acquired from the questionnaire documents were evaluated bycomputer spss programe and displayed as a table. Chi-square test, variant analysis,and t-tests were used in statistical analysis of data.Knowledge and applications of the personnel employed in the intensive careunits related to hospital infections were evaluated over 100. Scores of the assistantdoctors were calculated as 48.9 points, whereas the nurses scored 47.0 points and thehelper health care attendants scored 44,3 points. According to these results, theaverage level of knowledge and application scores of the personnel employed in theintensive care units, related to hospital infections, were detected to be low.Suggestions were made according to the results acquired in the study.Key Words: Hospital infections, knowledge level, hospital personnel