Background: Proper hand hygiene is one of the enhanced preventive measures immediately proposed to avoid the spreading of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2, also known as COVID-19. Objectives: The objective of this study was to estimate the prevalence of self-reported hand eczema signs and symptoms among healthcare workers in a Northern Italy University Hospital after the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Materials and methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted in June 2021. The hospital workers were invited to complete an online questionnaire through a link sent via institutional e-mail to both health personnel and support staff. Results: Eight-hundred and sixty-three subjects completed the questionnaire; 51.1% of them self-reported suffering from at least one hand skin lesion. One-hundred thirty-seven responders declared that they changed their hand hygiene habits, and 88.9% of them carried out these modifications both in occupational and domestic environments. In detail, a change in terms of daily hand washing frequency is reported as follows: before the COVID-19 pandemic, only 27.8% and 10.1% of responders washed their hands 10-20 and 20+ times per day, respectively, while after the pandemic, the percentage increased to 37.8% and 45.8%, respectively. When comparing the health care workers with the administrative staff, we observed a statistically significative difference (p = 0.0001) in the daily hand washing frequency among the two groups, with a higher value in health care personnel. Accordingly, a higher prevalence of hand eczema signs (52.8% versus 45.6%) was detected in the healthcare group. Conclusions: We underline the potential role of the pandemic in the spread of hand eczema as an occupational disease and the need to implement its prevention.
Keywords: COVID-19; hand eczema; healthcare workers; pandemic.