| Methods |
Prospective cohort study carried out in the Children's Hospital, Denver, to examine the effect of using gowns, masks and handwashing on the acquisition of symptomatic respiratory infections by medical personnel caring for infants with respiratory disease |
| Participants |
58 people of nursing, medical, respiratory therapy personnel; 30 in the handwashing group, 28 in the handwashing, masks and gowns. Seventy HCWs initially were available for enrolment, 9 refused to take part and 3 withdrew |
| Interventions |
Handwashing versus handwashing, masks and gowns |
| Outcomes |
Laboratory: yes
Effectiveness: viral infections (including RSV)
Safety: N/A |
| Notes |
Risk of bias: medium
Notes: the authors conclude that there was no difference between the 2 groups with respect to number of viral infections (i.e. 4/30 in the handwashing group versus 5/28 in the handwashing gown and masking group (P > 0.20). The findings cannot demonstrate any effect of adding the use of both gown and mask to the usual handwashing routine on the development of illness in personnel caring for infants with respiratory disease. Possible reasons for lack of effect are: the heavy exposure all adults have to respiratory viral illness in the community at large; poor compliance to the study protocol, modes of virus spread which would not be blocked by the use of mask and gown |
| Risk of bias |
| Bias |
Authors' judgement |
Support for judgement |
| Random sequence generation (selection bias) |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
| Allocation concealment (selection bias) |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
| Blinding (performance bias and detection bias)
All outcomes |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
| Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias)
All outcomes |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
| Selective reporting (reporting bias) |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
