Compliance with Standard Precaution Practices During the Early Phase of the Covid-19 Pandemic among Nurses in Nigeria

ABSTRACT

Background: Nurses serve at the frontline during disease outbreaks. While measures have been adopted to control the rapid spread of the Covid-19 pandemic, little is known about the level of compliance of nurses to standard precaution practices during the early phase of the pandemic. Objective: This study aimed to assess compliance with standard precaution practices (SPPs) among 713 nurses in Nigerian hospitals during the early phase of the pandemic. Method: The study adopted a descriptive cross-sectional design using an anonymous online questionnaire to elicit data from respondents. Data were analysed with the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences, version 25. Chisquare test and multiple regression analyses were also conducted where appropriate. Results: Findings from this study indicated that 448 (62.8%) of the respondents had good knowledge of Covid-19 and 265 (37.2%) had poor knowledge. Also, 529 (74.2%) had good compliance with the practice of standard precautions, and 184 (25.8%) showed non-compliance. A significant association was found between the age of nurses (X-2=14.034 p=0.015), years of experience (X-2=8. 636 p =0.035) and their overall compliance with the practice of standard precautions. Conclusion: During the early phase of the Covid-19 pandemic in Nigeria, although over an average of the nurses had good knowledge of the disease, over one-third had poor knowledge, and one-quarter showed poor compliance with standard precautions. Interventions to improve the knowledge and compliance of health workers during the early phase of disease outbreaks are hereby advocated, as 21.3% had no previous training on Covid-19.