ECJ EUROPEAN Cleaning Journal

Nearly seven out of ten nurses in the Netherlands use their mobile phones during the course of their job, according to a new study carried out in Dutch hospitals.

Yet a third of those nurses admit they hardly ever clean their mobile devices.

A total of 1,500 members of Dutch nursing body V&VN were questioned about their mobile use in a recent study. While 69 per cent of respondents claimed to use their phones regularly at work, one in three admitted to never cleaning them or only doing so a couple of times a year.

"We can make major improvements in this," said V&VN director Sonja Kersten, adding that she felt hospital hygiene rules should be expanded to take phones and tablets into account.

Mobile phones are now used widely by nurses globally to access patient records, clinical resources and education materials. Smartphones may also be used in hospitals to allow nurses to stay in touch with other healthcare professionals.

Studies carried out at the University Hospital of Saint-Étienne, France have revealed that up to 25 per cent of mobile phones used by healthcare workers may be contaminated with pathogens including Acinetobacter, MRSA and vancomycin-resistant enterococci.

The researchers also observed a failure to clean mobile devices on a regular basis among healthcare workers and that many neglected to wash their hands before and after using their smartphones. The study concluded that mobile phones may play a role in transmitting bacteria to patients via the hands of healthcare workers. And it added that hand hygiene - alongside the practice of cleaning and disinfecting devices - would be likely to decrease this risk.