Role of the nurse in preventing surgical site infection
Nurses need to be knowledgeable about the cause, effect and management of SSI to ensure optimum patient outcomes following surgery. This can be obtained by reading literature on the topic, and working closely with the infection control and audit and surveillance teams. There is a range of guidance available to assist nurses in preventing SSI, including the High Impact Intervention care bundle (DH 2007),SSI quality standards (NICE 2013) and the WHO (2009b) Surgical Safety Checklist. NICE (2008) guidance for the prevention and management of SSI outlines three phases: pre-operative, intra-operative and post-operative care (Box1)