title: Knowledge, attitudes, and practices of contact precautions among Iranian nurses.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Knowledge, attitudes, and contact precaution practices were surveyed in nurses at Shiraz University of Medical Sciences.
  
  
  METHODS
  Two hundred seventy nurses, midwives, and auxiliary nurses completed a questionnaire consisting of 8 knowledge items with corresponding attitudes and practices items.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Compliance with precaution practices was low, 19.5%, and little more than half, 51.8%, held positive attitudes toward the guidelines, whereas 65.5% could correctly answered all precaution knowledge items. Nurses with correct knowledge were 11.3 times more likely (P < .0001) to hold positive attitudes toward the guidelines and 14.2 times more likely (P < .0001) to comply with all 8 precaution practices, and compliers were 6.3 times more likely (P < .0001) to hold positive attitudes than noncompliers.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Although correct knowledge was associated with compliance and positive attitudes, the proportion of nurses who held positive attitudes also had good knowledge, and compliance with practices was not abundant. Better training coverage may result in compliance with precaution practices becoming the norm.
authors.affiliation: Department of Community Medicine, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran. askariam@sums.ac.ir
authors.forename: Mehrdad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Askarian
authors.forename: Ramin
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Shiraly
authors.forename: Mary-Louise
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: McLaws
mesh_terms: D003428:Cross Infection / Q000517:prevention & control*; D018562:Disease Transmission, Infectious / Q000517:prevention & control*; D019983:Guideline Adherence; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006785:Hospitals, University; D006801:Humans; D007492:Iran; D009726:Nurses; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires