Assessing the effectiveness of an educational intervention on knowledge of Infection control practices including Covid-19 among the health care workers

Abstract

Background: Healthcare workers (HCWs) are always at a risk of contracting infection due to their frequent exposure to infected individuals. Knowledge regarding various infection control practices especially in this pandemic era is mandatory to safeguard the HCWs. Objective: An interventional study was carried out to assess the level of knowledge of Infection control practices and standard precautions with special reference to COVID-19among the health care workers of a tertiary care teaching Hospital. Materials and methods: A total of 202, undergraduate students (UGs), postgraduate students (PGs), and non-teaching staff (NTS) participated in this study. A pre-test self-structured questionnaire regarding infection control practices and standard precautions with special reference to COVID-19 was distributed to all the participants. The study participants were then trained by the faculty of Microbiology and infection control team vigorously. The post-training questionnaire was subsequently given to the same group of subjects. The data from before and after training was evaluated and compared. Result: On post-training evaluation after the intervention, there was a significant increase in knowledge of various infection control practices among HCWs, as seen by comparing the results of the post-test questionnaire to its pre-test counterpart, because the HCWs' doubts were cleared in the education sessions. Conclusion:  The knowledge regarding the various infection control practices among the HCWs is short-lived and a significant increase was observed on post-training.  The health care settings should make a policy to carry out mandatory rotational repeated training by the Infection control team for all the groups of HCWs for better compliance.