Failure to Perform Hand Hygiene During Medication Administration
Penalty
Summary
A deficiency was identified when a nurse failed to follow the facility's infection prevention and control policies during medication administration. Specifically, during observation, the nurse did not perform hand hygiene before preparing or administering medications to two residents, nor did she perform hand hygiene between residents. Additionally, the nurse failed to perform hand hygiene before donning gloves and after removing gloves while administering eye drops to one of the residents. These actions were in direct violation of the facility's policies, which require hand hygiene before and after medication administration and before and after glove use during procedures such as eye drop administration. The nurse acknowledged during an interview that she was aware of the hand hygiene requirements but did not comply due to nervousness and forgetting the procedure. Interviews with the Nurse Practitioner, Director of Nursing, and Infection Preventionist confirmed that the expected practice is to perform hand hygiene between residents and before and after administering eye drops. The observations and staff interviews confirmed that the nurse's failure to perform hand hygiene constituted a breach of infection control protocols.