Knowledge, attitudes and behaviors towards hand washing of health professionals in a Macau hospital.

Objective: To investigate the knowledge, attitude and behaviors towards hand washing of the health professional in Macau. Method: 567 and 40 medical caretakers were selected for questionnaires and clinical observations respectively. Results: 491 effective questionnaires were collected, return rate is 86.6%. An average score of 81.6 was founded among the doctors or nurses on their knowledge to band washing and 98.6% of them knew that the purpose of bend washing is to protect individuals and patients from infection. It also showed that the rate of hand washing of the medical caretakers after patient contact was lower than that of before contact. The major reasons for this situation were that they were busy at work and these were not sufficient hand washing facilities at hand, etc. Conclusion: This research findings offered some suggestions for improvement so as to increase the hand washing rate and decrease nosocomial infection rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]