Hand Hygiene Awareness and Practices Among Dental Students of Generation Z in Malaysia

Hand hygiene is an effective infection control measure for preventing nosocomial pathogen transmission. Hand hygiene compliance should continuously be evaluated especially in Generation Z dental students. The objectives were to assess hand hygiene knowledge and practice of Generation Z dental students in Malaysia. A questionnaire was developed and distributed to the Generation Z final year dental students. 3 government and 2 private universities located at Klang valley were randomly selected by computer. All data were analysed using the SPSS Version 26.0.A total of 230 respondents were retrieved with response rate of 91.7% was recorded. The level of hand hygiene knowledge among Generation Z dental students are high and on par with one another. However, only 30 percent of the respondents know the main source of pathogen causing nosocomial infections Overall, the respondents show good practice of hand hygiene among all five universities (80.1%-100% per question). The findings proved that the level of hand hygiene knowledge of Generation Z dental students is up to its level best, in parallel with their practice. This shows that the teaching on the hand hygiene technique in the dentistry syllabus has successfully address the theory and their practical implementation.