PPE + Precautions

Class is back in session.

Imagine that it is your first day of clinical. You have bags under your eyes from not getting enough sleep the night before because of paperwork and nerves; but, you are smiling ear to ear in front of the unit doors ready to go in and finally do "nursey" things.

During orientation, your professors informed you that you could only go into standard, contact, and droplet precaution rooms. The charge nurse assigns you to a nurse veteran caring for a patient with c-diff and you think to yourself "I got this". After the awkward introductions to the nurse and maybe the not so warm welcome, you are finally off to assess your patient. You get to the front of the door with a big red poster on it saying STOP! Contact Precautions! You look to your left and see a four-drawer gray cart with all the necessary equipment for you to enter the room. As you are standing looking in front of the yellow gowns, masks, and gloves, you realize you completely forgot how to properly put on your PPE. You stand waiting for your nurse to don her PPE and quickly grab yours and follow her lead. After exiting the room you mentally beat yourself up for the rest of the day for not knowing something so basic.

Friends, knowing how to don proper PPE is important to protect yourself. However, if you are a new nursing student, please do not beat yourself up over it. There have been many times that I have gone to grab the wrong item before realizing that I need to do something first. The key is to catch your error before going through with your action. 

In preparing for my NCLEX, quite a few questions have surfaced regarding the donning and removal of PPE as well as what disease processes correspond with precautions. Thus, today's blog post. All information is taken off of the Center for Disease Prevention and Control's website. 

Putting on PPE

     First Gown: fasten in back of torso and neck

     Second Mask: fit flexible band to nose and fit snug beneath               chin

     Third Goggles or face shield

     Fourth Gloves

Removing PPE

  Example 1

     First Gloves: keep in mind that the outside is contaminated

     Second Goggles or face shield: remove ties or band behind head

     Third Gown: roll into itself

     Fourth Mask

     Fifth Wash hands

  Example 2

     First Gowns and Gloves: Pull on gown from front so that the              ties break, roll gown into itself taking gloves with it

     Second Goggles or face shield

     Third Mask

     Fourth Wash hands

 Infection Control and Prevention

Standard

-used when providing care to all patients

-minimum PPE is gloves

Contact

-diseases that are spread by direct or indirect contact

-PPE is gown and gloves

-examples: norovirus, rotavirus, C-Diff, open wounds, and ostomies

Droplet

-diseases spread by droplets

-in addition to standard precautions, wear a mask

-examples: pneumonia, flu, whooping cough, pertussis, meningitis

Airborne

-examples: measles, SARS, chicken pox, TB, herpes zoster

Hope this helps! Let me know if you have any requests for future posts.