Publications on hand-washing, hand-cleansing studies, policy
and practice-based documents were sought by searching the
following sources: CINAHL, Medline, Pubmed, Cochrane
libraries, electronic theses libraries, clinical guideline and
Department of Health libraries, Schools’ of Nursing curriculum
documents, where possible and the web of science. This
literature search was undertaken between June 2007–February
2008. Hand searching bibliographies and reference lists
of publications was also undertaken. Key words used in the
search included hand washing, hand cleansing, hand hygiene,
hand decontamination, infection control and primary care.
Journal articles and publications were selected if they
indicated a description or assessment of hand-washing
techniques