Are alcohol gels better than liquid hand rubs?
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* Corresponding author: Matthias Maiwald matthias.maiwald@flinders.edu.au
1 Department of Microbiology & Infectious Diseases, Flinders University and Flinders Medical Centre, Bedford Park, Adelaide, SA 5042, Australia
2 Division of Infectious Diseases & Hospital Epidemiology, University Hospitals Basel, Petersgraben 4, 4031 Basel, Switzerland
Critical Care 2007, 11:418 doi:10.1186/cc5947
Published: 6 July 2007First paragraph (this article has no abstract)
We read with great interest the study by Traore and coauthors, comparing an alcohol hand gel with a liquid hand hygiene formulation in an intensive care unit [1]. The authors reported better user acceptability for the gel. Compliance for both formulations was significantly better (P = 0.035) when healthcare workers had easy access to hand rubs, but the difference in compliance between the gel and the liquid was not statistically significant.