الفهرس 
INTRODUCTION AND AIMS OF WORKOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
Nosocomial infections are considered now one of the biggest risks facing healthcare service providers and users (National Health Service (NHS) Quality Improvement Scotland, 2005). While many infections can be prevented (Damani NN., 2003), and despite the fact that most of them can be successfully treated with good infection control practices - including appropriate antibiotic use - the burden of healthcare associated infections cannot be underestimated. The impact of healthcare associated infections in terms of human and financial costs is substantial.
Adherence to standard precaution guidelines has been problematic for HCWs universally so this study was conducted to identify knowledge, attitude and practice of doctors and nurses in Sohag University Hospital about standard precautions of infection control and the reasons of their non compliance with these precautions.
A total coverage of nurses and doctors who deal with patients in Sohag University Hospital was done to identify the awareness and compliance of doctors and nurses and to identify areas which need improvement. Data were collected through personal interviews with doctors and nurses by using an anonymous questionnaire which was constructed to cover a variety of items concerning knowledge, attitude and practice of doctors and nurses about standard precautions of infection control and the reasons of their non compliance.
As illustrated from the results of this study, most of doctors and nurses didn’t receive training or educational courses about infection control but most of them had positive attitudes towards most of infection control precautions and believed in their effectiveness in diminishing transmission of infection. However, these precautions weren’t strictly followed by most of doctors and nurses. By asking about the reasons of non compliance, it was clear that there were a variety of reasons including non availability of resources, inadequate hospital infrastructure, lack of time, lack of interest or belief in the benefits of compliance to these precautions and the protective devices weren’t comfortable.
In addition, there were no appropriate protocols for isolation of infectious patients and immunization of health care workers and linen handling such as segregation in specific bags and identifying with bio-hazardous labels. Although segregation of medical waste was applied but still not using typical puncture resistant sharp containers and there was no reporting system in case of sharps injuries.
The role of the infection control committee in the hospital must be strengthened in educating and training of health care workers and supervising their compliance to infection control precautions and increasing the awareness of them about the importance of implementing these precautions to protect themselves and their patients and prevent transmission of infection.