History of Hand Hygiene Increases Undergraduate Nursing Students’ Positive Attitude Toward Hand Hygiene Practice

Abstract

Various media on hand hygiene topics have been developed to make it easier for students to master the
procedure, but positive attitudes toward applying these skills have not significantly developed. The study aimed
to determine the effect of hand hygiene history on undergraduate nursing students’ attitudes to hand hygiene. A
quasi-experiment using a pre-and post-test with a control group design was conducted. Fifty-four students were
invited and randomly assigned to an intervention group and a control group. The intervention group obtained
the hand hygiene history through a booklet, while the control group got no treatment. The data were collected
using a questionnaire. The paired and unpaired t-test was applied to analyze the data. The results showed
that the average score of students’ attitudes in the intervention group increased from 58.44±5.98 to 65.52±5.29
(p<0.001), while in the control group, it only increased from 60.41 ± 4.12 to 60.78 ± 5.06 (p=0.769). There was a
significant difference in the attitude value between the two groups (p = 0.021). In conclusion, hand hygiene
history improved students’ attitudes toward hand hygiene significantly. This study recommends complementing
hand hygiene learning with its history so that students are skilled and have the expected attitude to apply it.