White coat wearing and laundering frequency among internal medicine department physicians

Edgardo Olvera-Lopez; Eleni McCaffery; Moiz Kasubhai

doi:10.1016/j.ajic.2019.10.017

White coat wearing and laundering frequency among internal medicine department physicians

Am J Infect Control. 2020 Jul;48(7):834-836. doi: 10.1016/j.ajic.2019.10.017. Epub 2019 Nov 22.

Authors

Edgardo Olvera-Lopez¹, Eleni McCaffery², Moiz Kasubhai²

Affiliations

¹ Internal Medicine Department, New York City Health and Hospitals/Lincoln, Bronx, NY. Electronic address: olverae@nychhc.org.
² Internal Medicine Department, New York City Health and Hospitals/Lincoln, Bronx, NY.

PMID: 31761291
DOI: 10.1016/j.ajic.2019.10.017

Abstract

Self-reported awareness of recommendations by the Society of Healthcare Epidemiology of America on white coat laundering remains low (21%) among physicians from the internal medicine department. Factors such as modifying the laundry schedule of the hospital and personalization of white coats can be considered by hospitals to increase adherence to such recommendations to decrease the risk of health care-associated infection and may also improve professional appearance.

Keywords: Hygiene; Infection precautions; Non operating room areas; Professional attire.

MeSH terms

Clothing
Humans
Internal Medicine
Laundering*
Physicians*
Surveys and Questionnaires