Background: Postoperative wound healing has been a problem which causes\nhigh mortality in the developing world; postoperative wound has been reported\nto cause devastating consequences and a measurable mortality. There\nis a limited number of published studies in Tanzania investigating Nursing\npractice on post-operative wound care in surgical wards at Muhimbili National\nHospital, Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania. This study assesses nursing practice\non postoperative wound care by nurses in surgical wards at Muhimbili\nNational Hospital. Methods: A cross-sectional study of surgical nurses was\ncarried out through the use of randomly selected surgical wards at Muhimbili\nNational Hospital in Tanzania from September 2011 to July 2013. A multistage\ncluster sampling technique was used to obtain a suitable number of\nstudy participants. Data collection was done using a checklist from a\nconvenient sample of 71 nurses in selected surgical wards. Results: The result\nindicates that a big number of the participants were female (76.5%) and those\nof the age group 25 to 34 years were 40.8%. Participants exceeding a half of\nthe selected sample reported to have poor post-operative wound care practice\n(57.7%). In comparison, male participants scored higher, and had better\npractice than their female counterparts, however, there was no considerable\ndifference in the scores (P = 0.803). During set-up and preparation phase, the\nwashing of hands before starting and after the completion of procedure was\ntaken into consideration by less than half of the participants (49.3%). All participants\ndid not ensure the environment is clean and take into account the\npatientâ??s privacy through the use of screen or even closing the room. The\nreport shows that nurses take into consideration putting on clean gloves during\n the removal of the old dressing (99%), the use of sterile gloves during\nwound dressing was taken into consideration by most of the nurses (63%).\nGood practice was noted in applying dressing solution as recommended\n(85%), dry sterile dressing was applied by (90%), arrangement and setting up\nof dressing forceps and other items that may be needed in order of their application\nusing forceps (20%), usage of forceps to dip gauze into antiseptic\nsolution (35%) and cleaning of the wound cleaning from least contaminated\nto most contaminated area was only adhered to by (34%). Post-operative\ncounseling and giving to the patient not to temper with the wound was done\nby a representation of only 15% of nurses. All the nurses did not do the documentation\nof the changes observed on the wound nor did they report on\nthe patients comfort and the date and time after the procedure wound\nchanges, reported patient comfort, and recorded date or time after the procedure.\nConclusion: Majority of the nurses in surgical wards do not follow\nthe postoperative wound care checklist provided by MNH although they\nknow its importance. Assessment of the wound and documentation continues\nto be a problem in the nursing profession in Tanzania. Nurses are reasonably\nknowledgeable about the principal of wound dressing; however, lack of\nknowledge on some of the key principles of wound dressing is worth noting.\nAlmost half of the nurses do not wash hands before and after the procedures,\nthey donâ??t use single gauze in one direction only, not cleaning from least\ncontaminated to most contaminated area, which can lead to wound contamination.
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