Effectiveness of a gamified educational intervention on hand hygiene among Nursing professionals: a quasi-experimental study.

OBJECTIVE: to assess the effectiveness of a gamified educational intervention on proper execution of the hand hygiene technique among nurses and nursing technicians in hospitalization units. METHOD: this quasi-experimental study of the before-and-after type was conducted with 45 Nursing professionals. The data were collected by means of a structured form to observe the technique before and after the intervention. The statistical data analysis was performed using Wilcoxon's Signed-Rank test and the McNemar test. RESULTS: in the pre-intervention period, 61.3% of the technicians and 42.9% of the nurses failed to follow all the technique steps; after the gamification, 100% of the nurses and 97.7% of the nursing technicians did implement the right steps (p<0.001) and forgot fewer stages (z=-4.532, p<0.001, r=0.81). The time to perform the technique was also adequate after the intervention, following the recommendations set forth by the World Health Organization (z=-2.441, p=0.015, r=0.36). CONCLUSION: the gamified educational intervention was effective in proper execution of the hand hygiene technique among nurses and nursing technicians, reducing errors and increasing compliance with the international guidelines.