Double Versus Single Glove Study

Double versus single glove procedure implications in the perioperative environment
Lee Brucato, Matthew Lower, Micah Miller
The University of Akron
Dr. Rose Baker & Dr. Rose Beeson

Healthcare professionals are routinely exposed to pathogens and seek to protect themselves while still providing the best possible care. Throughout the evolution of modern healthcare, practices have been studied and adopted to reduce the transmission of diseases from patients to others. Healthcare providers must maintain their own safety when caring for a patient with a communicable disease to reduce the risk of transmitting disease to oneself or other patients. Therefore, practices that protect a healthcare provider from
Throughout the studies, perioperative personnel were used as the subject populations. Half of the studies focused on perforation rates of the outer pair of gloves versus the inner pair of gloves. One of these studies did not compare the location of the perforations between the outer and inner layer of gloves while the other two involving this examination did document common perforation sites.
The other half of the studies examined overall exposure to fluids by the perioperative personnel’s hands. Not all of the studies specifically focused on nurses, but instead anybody who had higher risks of exposure. These people were typically the surgeon, the first assistant, and the scrub nurse. Thus in most studies involving DGP, all surgical personnel with high exposure to fluids were included. When all surgical personnel were examined, only one third of the results involved nurses as
- double gloving would reduce the average perioperative nurse from 158 perforations a year down to an annual average of 43. Double gloving is recommended for low-risk surgical procedures.
If double gloving for low-risk surgical procedures is implemented, the number of perforations will decline, resulting in a lower risk of contamination.
Data and results are limited to perioperative nurses in low-risk surgical procedures. High risk procedures already have double gloving as the standard.
Phillips, S. The comparison of double gloving to single gloving in the theatre environment. 2011
“The role of surgical gloving is to minimise the risk of surgical site infection (SSI) and to protect the surgical team from cross infection. However, different practitioners have different views as to when double gloving is appropriate, with many factors like speciality and procedure dictating their use. This review will look at best practice through the evidence available and provide recommendations for practice.”
Does double gloving or single gloving provide better protection in the theatre