Nurses' knowledge about infection prevention for patients with leukemia

Abstract EN

Background : Typically, patients with leukemia require immediate therapeutic intervention but most patients seek medical attention for symptoms related to anemia, infection, or bleeding.

For undetermined reasons, fever and infection also increase the likelihood of bleeding, thus, the patients with leukemia are always threatened by infection.

Aims of the study : The study aims to assess the nurses' knowledge about infection prevention for patients with leukemia and to find out the relationship between their knowledge and demographic characteristics (years of experience and training courses).

Methodology : A descriptive study carried out at Baghdad teaching hospital and starting from September 7th, 2019 up to December 17th, 2019.

This study used a non-probability (purposive) sample of (30) nurses that caring of patients with leukemia at medical wards at Baghdad teaching hospital.

The data collected with designed questionnaire, which consists of two forms ; nurses' demographic characteristics and nurses' knowledge about prevention of infection.

The validity of the questionnaire was determined through an expert panel and its reliability was determined through a pilot study by test – retest which was estimated as averages (R = 0.87).

Data was collected by direct interview and data was analyzed by application of descriptive and inferential statistical methods (frequency, percentage, mean of score, Pearson correlation and Chi-Square).

Results : The results of the study indicated that the study sample was male (70 %), (53.4 %) within age group (20-29 years), (60 %) was living in urban areas, and (40%) was single.

(46.7 %) was having (4-6) years of experience in oncology wards.

Conclusion : The results showed that the majority of study sample reflect a moderate significance of knowledge in the measures taken by the nurse toward infection prevention, while showing low significance in patient teaching about infection prevention.

In addition, there is a high significant relationship between nurses' knowledge and their years of experience and having training courses inside and outside Iraq.

Recommendations : The study recommended starting a set of specialized training courses concerning the infection prevention under the supervision of academic and practitioner experts and further guidelines of infection control must applied in medical wards at Baghdad teaching hospitals.