Last update:
   15-Jul-2026
 

Arch Hellen Med, 43(6), November-December 2026, 769-779

ORIGINAL PAPER

Knowledge, perceptions, attitudes and practices of Greek healthcare professionals towards hand hygiene

T. Anastasiou,1 I. Tsatsou,2 E. Lachana,3 K. Karathanasi4
1Department of Infection Control, 401 Hellenic Army General Hospital, Athens
2One Day Clinic, 251 Hellenic Airforce General Hospital, Athens
3Department of Public and Integrated Health, School of Health Sciences, University of Thessaly, Larissa
4School of Social Sciences, Hellenic Open University, Patras, Greece

OBJECTIVE To investigate the current knowledge, perceptions, attitudes, and practices of healthcare workers in Greece towards hand hygiene.

METHOD A cross-sectional study using a randomized sample was conducted in 2023. A total of 177 healthcare professionals working in healthcare settings in Greece participated. The data were collected with web-distributed questionnaires that included the World Health Organization's "Perception Survey and Hand Hygiene Knowledge Questionnaire for Health-Care Workers", the "Knowledge, attitudes, and practices of nurses towards hand washing" questionnaire, and "Adherence to hand hygiene in a hospital setting – a questionnaire survey".

RESULTS The majority of the participants were women with an average age of 41 years, nurses with a received higher education. A significant deficit of knowledge was recorded on hand hygiene, and 53.7% had some kind of training on this issue in the last three years. The knowledge score was 70.5±7.9 (mean±standard deviation [SD], indicating a mediocre knowledge on hand hygiene. The attitude score was mean±SD=98.5±7.8, indicating excellent attitudes towards hand hygiene. The practice score was mean±SD=84.5±16.1, indicating fair good practices towards hand hygiene. The score for glove use was mean±SD=5.4±0.8, indicating almost excellent practices towards the use of gloves. Τhe first effective intervention for hand hygiene improvement in the workplace was the health-care facility making alcohol-based handrub always available at each point of care (mean±SD=3.7±0.6). Participants who had more knowledge of hand hygiene had better practices (p=0.02) and use of gloves (p=0.03). Healthcare professionals with a master's/doctorate degree had more knowledge on hand hygiene (p=0.003), as well as women (p=0.016) and nurses (p<0.001) had better glove use.

CONCLUSIONS The average level of knowledge on hand hygiene raises the need to support and educate Greek healthcare professionals.

Key words: Attitudes, Gloves, Hand hygiene, Healthcare professionals, Hospital infections, Knowledge, Perceptions, Practices.

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