Association between Hospital Nurses’ Perception of Patient Safety Management and Standard Precaution Adherence: A Cross-Sectional Study

Lim, Ji-Hye; Ahn, Jung-Won; Son, Youn-Jung

The Korean government adopted a Health Care Accreditation policy in 2004 to assess medical service quality and continuously strengthen insufficient areas [11] . Thus, the Patient Safety Act was enacted in early 2015. In 2017, the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Korean Society for Health Care-associated Infection Control and Prevention developed a standardized health care-associated infection prevention guideline in accordance with the circumstances [5] . Adherence to standard precautions comprises the minimum infection prevention practices that apply to all patient care including hand hygiene, sharps safety, use of personal protection, respiratory hygiene; safe management of blood and body fluid spillages; and decontamination of equipment, waste, linen, and laundry [10] . While standard precautions serve as the universal infection prevention guidelines which must always be followed, the results of several studies focused on nurses have revealed low adherence rates [1, 12] .