[Quality of hand hygiene of active professionals in basic health units]

The study aims to evalue the quality of hand hygiene of professionals who worked in Basic Healthcare Units in ten cities in the south of the state of Santa Catarina, Brazil. The research was conducted in 2008. It was a cross-sectional epidemiological study that observed 369 health professionals. A chi-square test was carried out to verify the association of socio-demographic variables and training with the performance of the professionals. During the surgical procedures only 30.7% of the professionals performed a correct hand hygiene, while in clinical procedures 31.7% did. During surgical procedure, graduated professionals did a better hand hygiene than professionals who only had high-school or equivalent training (p < 0.05), while professionals over 35 years old presented a better hygiene in the clinical procedures than younger ones (p < 0.05). The conclusion is that less than a third of the professionals were performing a proper hand hygiene.