Knowledge, attitudes, practices and barriers of oral hygiene care among nurses caring for geriatric inpatients in Malaysia / Ghayathri Devi Manoharan

Ghayathri Devi , Manoharan (2024) Knowledge, attitudes, practices and barriers of oral hygiene care among nurses caring for geriatric inpatients in Malaysia / Ghayathri Devi Manoharan. Masters thesis, Universiti Malaya.

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Abstract

Background: The older adult population in Malaysia and around the world is increasing due to the advancement and improvement in health care delivery and awareness on healthcare needs of this population. An important area of need that is often neglected in older people is oral health, especially when they are frail and need hospitalisation. The hospital admission provides an excellent opportunity to address poor oral health in older people, a group rarely seen by dental professionals and for whom oral hygiene tasks performed in hospital is inconsistent and suboptimal. Nurses are in the best position to educate and provide daily oral hygiene care for these patients. Aim: To assess the level of knowledge, attitude, current practices, and barriers regarding oral hygiene care among nurses caring for older inpatients. Methods: This multi-centre study was conducted in ten hospitals with geriatric medicine units in Malaysia. Cross sectional study design and a purposive sampling were used to assess the knowledge, attitude, practices, and barriers (KAP+B) of oral hygiene care among nurses caring for older inpatients. This study was conducted using a newly adapted oral hygiene care questionnaire on the KAP+B of nurses caring for older inpatients, as the primary tool, which was distributed via the online platform (Google Forms). The adapted questionnaire comprised of five main areas: the respondent’s personal and work-related information (social demographic), assessment oral hygiene care knowledge, identification of current oral hygiene care practices, attitude to oral hygiene care, and the barriers that may impact their ability to conduct oral hygiene care for older inpatients. Results: A total of 141 nurses from the geriatric medicine wards of ten selected hospitals under the Ministry of Health Malaysia participated in the study giving an overall response rate of 94%. This study revealed that participants were at a good level of knowledge, had a good attitude level regarding oral hygiene care and exhibited high level of practices for oral hygiene care for older inpatients. Majority of the participants are in the low-level regarding barriers faced to provide oral hygiene care for older inpatients The results also suggest, there is a significant association between the level of highest qualification and the factors of knowledge, attitude, practices, and barriers during oral hygiene care for older inpatients among nurses. Conclusion: The findings of this study show that the nurses had a sound knowledge, good attitudes and practices and were able to identify the barriers faced in the provision of oral hygiene care for older inpatients under their care. It can also be concluded that knowledge, attitude, practice, and barriers among nurses providing oral hygiene care for older inpatients in the geriatric ward are not dependent on each other.

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