Impact of the fluorescent concretization intervention on effectiveness of hand hygiene in nursing students: A randomized controlled study

Abstract

Background: Hand hygiene is the most effective and simplest infection control method but there is a considerable amount of evidence that shows hand hygiene skills of nursing students should be improved. Nursing education plays an important role in giving nursing students the necessary knowledge, beliefs and teaching and improving basic hand hygiene skills. An effective learning method that enables students to understand both the practical skills and the underlying theoretical principles should be used in teaching hand hygiene. Objectives: The aim of this study was to compare the effects of a fluorescent concretization intervention and conventional education on improving the hand hygiene beliefs and skills of nursing students. Design and setting: This double blinded pretest-posttest randomized controlled trial was carried out from January 1 to June 1, 2019 with the participation of 126 nursing students in a faculty of health science in a state university in Turkey. Methods: The participants were randomly assigned to an intervention group (n = 63), receiving education with a fluorescent concretization intervention, and a control group (n = 63) receiving conventional education. Results: There was a significant difference between the intervention and control groups in terms of the total post-test hand hygiene belief score (p = .016 effect size(r) = 0.214). The final handwashing skill score of the students in the intervention group increased significantly for the seven regions of hands (p < .001 effect size(r) = 0.863). In addition, final handwashing skill score in the intervention group (20.62 +/- 4.07) was found to be significantly higher than that of the students in the control group (12.57 +/- 2.85) (p < .001 effect size(r) = 0.805). Conclusion: Hand hygiene training which includes visual concretization intervention with glo germ can be used as a useful strategy to improve nursing students' negative beliefs about hand hygiene and to gain students to effective handwashing behaviors.