Quiz 4: Hand hygiene

Please choose the one, most correct answer to each question or statement.

1. Which is the most common mode of infection transmission in healthcare settings?
   • Via hands
   • Coughing and sneezing
   • Needlestick injuries
   • Contaminated food and water.
2. What is the single most important reason for healthcare workers to practise good hand hygiene?
   • To remove visible soiling from hands
   • To prevent transfer of bacteria from the home to the hospital
   • To prevent transfer of bacteria from the hospital to the home
   • To prevent healthcare-associated infections.
3. Healthcare workers should be encouraged to:
   • Not wear rings and bracelets, but may wear watches.
   • Not wear rings, bracelets and watches, but may wear artificial nails.
   • Not wear rings, bracelets and watches, but may have long nails
   • Not wear rings, bracelets and watches, and keep nails short.
4. Which one of the ‘five moments for hand hygiene’ is the most important?
   • Before and after patient contact
   • Before an aseptic procedure
   • After body fluid exposure and contact with patient surroundings
   • They are all equally important.
5. Which of the ‘five moments for hand hygiene’ do healthcare workers forget most often?
   • Before patient contact
   • After patient contact
   • Before aseptic procedure
   • After contact with patient surroundings.
6. To perform adequate hand hygiene healthcare workers need:
   • 80–90 seconds for handwash with soap and water
   • 20–30 seconds for alcohol handrub
   • 20–30 seconds for handwash with soap and water
   • 10–15 seconds for alcohol handrub.
7. Which is the most commonly missed area of the hand when performing hand hygiene?
   • The palm of the hand
   • The middle and index fingers
   • Back of the hand
   • Around the fingernails/fingertips.
8. When should gloves be changed?
   • When they are dirty
   • When moving from a contaminated body area to a ‘clean’ area of the same patient
   • When moving to another patient
   • All of the above.
9. For which of these tasks should gloves be worn?
   • When changing fluid administration sets
   • For turning or re-positioning bed-bound patients
   • When touching a patient known to be colonised with resistant bacteria
   • When feeding patients.
10. Identify the only correct practice:
    • Pouring antiseptic solutions from one bottle to another
    • Using the same pair of gloves for more than one patient
    • Touching a patient without thoroughly drying hands
    • Using alcohol handrub when hands are not visibly contaminated.
11. What is the most effective and fastest way to clean your hands before patient contact?
    • Soap and water
    • Water only
    • Antimicrobial soap and water
    • Alcohol handrub.
12. Which form of hand hygiene is not appropriate after exposure to blood?
    • Soap and water
    • Water only
    • Antimicrobial soap and water
    • Alcohol handrub.
13. Which of the following hand hygiene agents is least drying to your skin?
    • Plain soap and water
    • Antimicrobial soap and water
    • Alcohol-based handrub
    • Soap and water followed by alcohol-based handrub.
14. Hand hygiene using alcohol-based handrub rather than soap and water:
    • Is less effective than soap and water
    • Takes longer to perform
    • Causes more skin irritation
    • Results in greater reduction in bacterial numbers.
15. Where should alcohol handrub be made available?
    • In the waiting room
    • In the bathrooms
    • Placed at the washbasins
    • At the point of care.
16. The ideal handwashing basin/station should include which of the following?
    • A place to put the wet soap
    • Elbow-operated, ‘no touch’ taps
    • Alcohol handrub mounted at the sink
    • A plug for the sink.
17. Which strategy can improve healthcare workers’ hand hygiene compliance rates?
    • Fine or give verbal warnings to health-care workers who do not comply
    • Give each healthcare worker their own bar of soap
    • Place cotton hand towels at each wash basin
    • Monitoring compliance rates and giving feedback on performance.
18. Which interventions improve the use of alcohol handrub?
    • Education about the superiority of alcohol handrub and increasing ease of access
    • Improving quality of alcohol-based solutions with increased glycerol to protect hands
    • Providing instructions for staff explaining how to use alcohol handrub
    • All the above.
19. The main reasons for hand hygiene non-compliance reported by the healthcare workers are:
    • Too busy to perform hand hygiene
    • Frequent handwashing results in skin irritation
    • It’s easier to use gloves than to wash hands
    • All of the above.
20. Which group of healthcare workers has the lowest hand hygiene compliance rates (according to the literature)?
    • Nurses
    • Doctors
    • Medical students
    • Physiotherapists.