Nurses Role in Infection Control

This article discusses the important role of nurses in preventing the spread of infection in healthcare settings. It covers common practices of infection control, including hand hygiene, personal protective equipment, and proper handling of contaminated materials. The article emphasizes the importance of taking effective measures to reduce the risks of spreading infection and stop pathogens from spreading.

Running Head: Infection Control
Nurses Role in Infection Control

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Infection control
Introduction
When a disease-causing agent invades the body tissue of an organism it is known as
infection. The infection spreads when such infectious agents invade a host tissue and multiply
themselves. Control of infection and prevention of all types of infection is a major issue in
healthcare settings and all healthcare professionals look forward to curb this. In such issues,
nurses play a vital role in the preventing the infection and to stop it from spreading. It is crucial
for nurses to be competent with the process of infections and to know their roles in curbing the
infection as this earlier call will help them in curing the infection from spreading more (Brown et
al., 2017).
Common Role of nurses
Usually, nurses across all healthcare settings and hospitals have a common role to play.
The most basic role is in assisting the doctors to perform an operation and surgical procedure
more effectively. Along with providing assistance to the doctors, there are some vital roles that
nurses have to play which are:
 Recording the patients' blood pressure, temperature, height and weight, pulse rate etc.
 Transfusing the blood and giving injections to patients at regular interval as per the
prescription of the physicians.
 Cleaning the wounds, changing the dress and bed cover of the patient, taking care of the
food and ensuring that it's healthy and nutritious.
 Random audits of patients health, monitoring and reporting it directly to the doctors.
 Maintaining the track record of the health of patients, giving CPR to patients in
emergency conditions, catheterization etc.
Role of nurses in Infection control
There are several types of healthcare-associated infections like urinary tract infection,
bloodstream infection, wound infection which is common and most prevailing and it is the prime
role of a nurse to stop this infection from spreading. Some of the common practices of infection
control are:

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 Hand hygiene
It is important to practice such habit as it is very crucial for a nurse to stop the
transmission of infection. Washing the hands properly is one of the easy and important ways to
reduce the transmission of infection. Nurses should ensure that they wash and rinse their hands
properly before and after shaking hands, giving physiotherapy, taking the measure of blood
pressure, body temperature and pulse rate (Jimmieson et al., 2016). These are some of the
common activities performed by a nurse and they should ensure that a proper hygiene is
maintained whenever there is a contact with any medical equipment or before and after touching
any patient. Moreover, keeping the hands clean reduces the risk of Nosocomial infections which
usually spreads through unhygienic hands (Carter, 2018).
 Personal protective equipment
Personal protective equipment (PPE) includes masks, gloves, gowns and other protective
equipment used for face, mouth, and eye and during inhalation. It is mandatory to use such
equipment while performing surgical procedure as it is highly likely that there are chances of
contact of blood and other OPIM with the clothing or any other body part which is exposed
(Howe, 2015). PPE is worn based on the type of patient, nature of the disease and the mode by
which a pathogen can be transmitted. But it is must for a nurse to dawn the gloves and masks as
it reduces the contact of blood with the body (Dorgham and Obied, 2016).
 Sharp precautions
Devices such as needles, scalpels are called sharps which are intentionally designed to
penetrate the skin easily. Hypodermic needles, IV devices are some of the common examples of
sharp devices. These devices carry a potential risk of blood born infection which are HCV,
AIDS, HBV so it should be ensured that disposal of such items are done safely so that it doesn't
come in direct contact with anyone. There should be a separate box for sharps where the disposal
can be done easily. The injuries caused due to these must be notified immediately to a medical
consultant and proper precaution should be taken. Special care should be taken in the case of
needles that are not to recap them (Ghasemi et al., 2017).
 Proper handling of contaminated materials
People often come across with several contaminated materials in the hospitals. It should
be ensured that in case of B/BF spillage, gloves should be used and to wipe up the spill a paper

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or towel should be used. Also, special care should be addressed while handling lab specimens as
these are highly contaminating materials so a strong and handy plastic bag should be used to
handle them. Infectious waste should be collected in separate bags which are leakage proof and
color coded. The best practice to destroy contaminated waste is by incineration which is a
process in which all the waste is burned leaving no infectious pathogens alive (Norton and
Holloway, 2016).
 Standard Precautions
Along with all the above measures, there are some predefined standard procedures that
need to be taken care of which reduce the risk of transmission of certain bacteria and viruses like
Hepatitis B, HIV, and other blood-borne pathogens. Under this procedure, the patient's blood and
other associated body fluids are considered as a potential means of infection. Proper isolation of
patients should be there in case of patients suffering from chicken pox, swine flu, and dialysis
patients and patients whose organ transplantation has been done so that the infection should not
come in contact with a normal healthy person (Zingg et al., 2015).
Conclusion
The discussion in the article is based on the fact that how crucial is the role of nurses in
stopping the transmission of infection. It is very important for a nurse to take care of all the
effective measures to reduce the risks of spreading of infection and to stop the pathogens from
spreading. Before performing any procedure it should be ensured that all effective measures have
been taken care of like washing the hands, wearing all the personal protective equipment's and
also this practice should be continued till the end of the procedure where all the waste materials
have been dumped off leaving no scope of infection spreading. Therefore using certain policies
and procedures, nurses can ensure that the risk of spreading infection can be minimized to a
ground level.

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References
Brown, D., Edwards, H., Seaton, L. and Buckley, T., 2017. Lewis's Medical-Surgical Nursing:
Assessment and Management of Clinical Problems. Elsevier Health Sciences.
Carter, E.J., Greendyke, W.G., Furuya, E.Y., Srinivasan, A., Shelley, A.N., Bothra, A., Saiman,
L. and Larson, E.L., 2018. Exploring the nurses' role in antibiotic stewardship: A multisite
qualitative study of nurses and infection preventionists. American journal of infection
control, 46(5), pp.492-497.
Dorgham, S.R. and Obied, H.K., 2016. Factors affecting nurse interns’ compliance with standard
precautions for preventing stick injury. Journal of Nursing Education and Practice, 6(12), p.121.
Ghasemi, M., Khabazkhoob, M., Hashemi, H., Yekta, A. and Nabovati, P., 2017. The incidence
of needle stick and sharp injuries and their associations with visual function among hospital
nurses. Journal of current ophthalmology, 29(3), pp.214-220.
Howe, S., 2015. Use of personal protective equipment in dental practices. Dental Nursing, 11(8),
pp.464-467.
Jimmieson, N.L., Tucker, M.K., White, K.M., Liao, J., Campbell, M., Brain, D., Page, K.,
Barnett, A.G. and Graves, N., 2016. The role of time pressure and different psychological safety
climate referents in the prediction of nurses’ hand hygiene compliance. Safety Science, 82,
pp.29-43.
Norton, W. and Holloway, D., 2016. Endometriosis: The role practice nurses can play. Practice
nursing, 27(5), pp.244-249.
Zingg, W., Holmes, A., Dettenkofer, M., Goetting, T., Secci, F., Clack, L., Allegranzi, B.,
Magiorakos, A.P. and Pittet, D., 2015. Hospital organisation, management, and structure for
prevention of health-care-associated infection: a systematic review and expert consensus. The
Lancet Infectious Diseases, 15(2), pp.212-224.

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