A survey study on perceptions and attitudes of nurses and nursing aides toward oral and body hygiene for hospitalized geriatric patients

Introduction: Many nurses perform body hygiene for geriatric patients on a daily basis while the performance of oral hygiene is often skipped. Insight into perceptions of caregivers toward personal hygiene for geriatric patients might help in setting up strategies to improve nursing care for oral and body hygiene. Methods: The Personal Hygiene Perceptions and Attitudes Questionnaire was developed, validated and distributed to 312 nurses and nursing aids of a non-academic general hospital. Results: Most commonly reported barriers in performing oral hygiene were ‘Patient’s resistance’ (53%) and 'Not enough time’ (37%). This was 37% and 6% for body hygiene, respectively. Overall 49% and 20% experienced no barrier for body hygiene and oral hygiene, respectively. Oral hygiene and body hygiene was a priority in 88% and 97%, respectively. For all different oral care interventions, at least 75% of the caregivers agreed on the statement ‘I have enough knowledge about this specific care interventions’ and 'I think this care aspect of oral care is important'. Only 21% performed oral care interventions according to the recommended frequency. 100% indicated that they had sufficient knowledge about all different nursing interventions for body hygiene and considered these interventions as important. Conclusions: Nurses give more priority to body hygiene at the expense of performing oral hygiene. Oral care isn’t performed according to the recommended frequency, most likely because of the perceived barriers.status: accepte