Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2012 May 16;5:CD003325.
Removal of nail polish and finger rings to prevent surgical infection.
Abstract
BACKGROUND:
Surgical
wound infections may be caused by the transfer of bacteria from the
hands of surgical teams to patients during operations. Surgical
scrubbing prior to surgery reduces the number of bacteria on the skin,
but wearing rings and nail polish on the fingers may reduce the efficacy
of scrubbing, as bacteria may remain in microscopic imperfections of
nail polish and on the skin beneath rings.
OBJECTIVES:
To
assess the effect of the presence or absence of rings and nail polish
on the hands of the surgical scrub team on postoperative wound infection
rates.
MAIN RESULTS:
We identified: no
new trials; no RCTs that compared wearing of rings with the removal of
rings; and no trials of nail polish versus no nail polish that measured
surgical infection rates. We found one small RCT (102 scrub nurses) that
evaluated the effect of nail polish on the number of bacterial colony
forming units left on hands after pre-operative surgical scrubbing.
Nurses had either unpolished nails, freshly-applied nail polish (less
than two days old), or old nail polish (more than four days old). There
were no significant differences in the number of bacteria on hands
between the groups before and after surgical scrubbing.
AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS:
No
trials have investigated whether wearing nail polish or finger rings
affects the rate of surgical wound infection. There is insufficient
evidence to determine whether wearing nail polish affects the number of
bacteria on the skin post-scrub.
