IJSR International Journal of Scientific Research 2277 - 8179 Indian Society for Health and Advanced Research ijsr-9-8-26759 Original Research Paper Self-reported Awareness, Approach, and Application of Infection Control Practices among Nursing Staff in Intensive Care Units at King Salman Armed Forces Hospital in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia Van Rooyen Dr. Nasrin S Saiyed Dr. Abdulrahman Abdullah Alyousif Dr. Ahmed Awaji Dr. August 2020 9 8 01 02 ABSTRACT

Background: Infection control in hospitals remains a challenge to healthcare policymakers and world healthcare leaders. This study was aimed to explore the factors associated with self–reported awareness, approach, and application of infection control practices and to describe the barriers and enablers to such practice among registered nurses in all intensive care units (ICUs) at King Salman Armed Forces Hospital in Tabuk, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Methods: A cross–sectional, descriptive and comparative study was conducted from January 2016 to June 2016. One hundred twenty–four registered nurses voluntarily participated in the study. Data was collected using a self–reported questionnaire. The data was analyzed using IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 25 for Windows. Descriptive statistics and one–way ANOVA were used to analyze the data. Results: The registered nurses demonstrated high level of awareness, approach, and application of implementing infection control standard and guidelines. No statistically significant differences were found between mean awareness scores in age, gender, and education. Statistically significant differences were found between mean application scores in age and current working unit (p–values 0.05, 0.009 respectively). Conclusion: The awareness and application of implementing infection control standards and guidelines among the registered nurses were good. However, there is still a wide scope of improvement with regular educational training programs.