Assessing undergraduate nursing and midwifery students' compliance with hand hygiene by self-report

The aim of the study was to assess undergraduate nursing and midwifery students' hand hygiene (HH) compliance. The questionnaire included questions about HH behaviours and compliance during patient care, and Fulkerson scale was used to relate HH to cleanliness of various activities. 57.4% of them reported that they used liquid soap for HH. 18.6% of them did not dry their hands after washing. 65.9% of them said that they performed HH when passing from one patient to another. HH rates were 80.7% after removing gloves. The first six activities on the Fulkerson scale were described as 'clean'; most of the students assessed the third, fourth, fifth and sixth activities as 'dirty'. Compliance with HH was high for all dirty and clean activities. Self-report method indicates compliance with HH which was an easy and inexpensive way to provide the information on HH.