Adherence of Health Care Workers to Personal Protective Equipment During Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic

2020 
Background An outbreak of a novel corona viral pneumonia started in China late 2019 World Health organization on March 11 declared coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) a pandemic In China, an estimated 3000 health care workers (HCWs) have been infected The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released recommendations for the use of personal protective equipment when treating patients with COVID-19 to minimize the risk of acquiring infection among HCWs This study aimed to assess adherence of HCWs in Iraq to personal protective equipment during COVID-19 pandemic Methods This was an online survey of a group of Iraqi doctors regarding their adherence to personal protective equipment Results Most of the surveyed physicians (120) adequately follow the recommendations regarding their personal hygiene, use of masks/respirators, and wearing equipment while providing care for suspected or confirmed cases of COVID-19 However, 11% and 16% do not follow the recommendations while caring for COVID-19 cases and performing aerosol-generating procedures, respectively Majority of the respondents admit the importance of these measures in lowering the risk of infection Approximately, two third of the participants started the measures at the beginning or the middle of the outbreak Conclusions Most of Iraqi heath care workers involved in the survey follow the recommendations regarding personal protective equipment Correspondence to: Majid Alabbood, MD, Department of Medicine, Alzahraa College of Medicine, University of Basrah, Bab Alzubair Compound, Basra, Iraq E-mail: dr_majid79@yahoo com The authors have no funding or conflicts of interest to disclose This article is made available via the PMC Open Access Subset for unrestricted re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source These permissions are granted for the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic or until permissions are revoked in writing Upon expiration of these permissions, PMC is granted a perpetual license to make this article available via PMC and Europe PMC, consistent with existing copyright protections Copyright © 2020 Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc All rights reserved
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