Nurses Knowledge Regarding Personal Protective Equipment in Intensive Care Units at a Public Tertiary Care Public Hospital, Peshawar

Abstract

PPE is designed to protect Health Care Workers (HCWs) from workplace infections and injuries and the most commonly used equipment including goggles, masks,  medical gloves, and respirators. Objective: To determine nurses’ knowledge regarding PPE in intensive care units at a Public Tertiary Care Hospital, in Peshawar, Pakistan. Methods: A cross-sectional study was directed using convenient sampling. A structured questionnaire from the literature was used to collect the data. Responses of the participants as good/Average/Poor were recorded. The data were collected from the Nurses who have five or more than five years of experience in the intensive care units of  Hayatabad Medical Complex, a Public sector tertiary care Hospital. Results: The mean age of the participant was evaluated which was 30.09 years with a standard deviation of 7.04 years. The professional experience of the participants was 6.78 years with a standard deviation of 5.85 years. Our study shows that 65.4% had good knowledge or an acceptable knowledge level, 30.9% had average knowledge, and 3.7% of the participants had poor knowledge. Conclusions: The study concluded that most of the participants have good knowledge of Personal Protective equipment but a significant number of participants had average knowledge and some have poor knowledge as well. Therefore, regular sessions should be given to enhance the knowledge level