Infection Control and Safety: Essential Guidelines for First Aid

When performing first aid, it is important to protect yourself and the casualty from the risk of infection or injury.

There are a number of different infection control precautions that you can take when providing first aid, including:

• Wash your hands before performing first aid where possible.
• Where available, always wear disposable nitrile examination gloves.
• Be careful not to touch dirty surfaces or equipment when wearing gloves.
• If available, use personal protective clothing (PPE).
• Where possible, avoid contact with bodily fluids.
• After treatment, ensure that you clean both yourself and, if applicable, the casualty.
• Dispose of any dressings, bandages, or sharps.
• Wash hands thoroughly with soap, even if gloves were used.
• If available, use a mask when performing rescue breaths.

First aiders should take standard precautions to avoid becoming ill and exposing others to illness when handling blood or body substances. Standard precautions are work practices applied to all patients and their blood and body substances, regardless of their infectious status, to ensure a basic level of infection prevention and control.

Standard precautions include hand hygiene, use of personal protective equipment, appropriate handling and disposal of sharps and waste, cleaning techniques, and managing spills of blood and body substances.

Providing First Aid Safely

Before providing first aid to an injured or ill person, first aiders should assume they could be exposed to infection.

First aiders should:

• Wash their hands with soap and water or apply alcohol-based hand rub before and after administering first aid.
• Wear personal protective equipment (PPE), including disposable gloves, to prevent contact with blood and body substances.
• Use additional PPE, such as eye protection, a mask, and protective clothing, if splashes of blood or body substances are likely to occur.

Establish procedures to protect first aiders and others from infection risk during first aid provision. Procedures could include:

• Proper hand hygiene practices.
• Handling and disposing of sharps appropriately.
• Cleaning surfaces and reusable equipment effectively.
• Managing spills and cleaning soiled laundry.
• Handling and disposing of waste correctly.
• Using personal protective equipment, such as resuscitation masks for cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).

First aiders should be aware of what to do if they come into accidental contact with blood, body substances, or sharps, or are exposed to a contagious illness. Wash any part of the body that comes into contact with blood or body substances with soap and water immediately, and seek prompt medical advice.

All first aiders should be offered a hepatitis B virus vaccination.

Contaminated Items

Items soiled with blood or body substances should be placed in plastic bags and tied securely. Waste disposal must comply with state or local government requirements.

Sharps, including scissors, tweezers, syringes, and disposable probes, should be disposed of in a rigid-walled, puncture-resistant sharps container by the person who used them. Guidance on sharps container design and markings can be found in:

• AS 4031-1992 – Non-reusable containers for the collection of sharp medical items used in health care areas.
• AS/NZS 4261-1994 – Reusable containers for the collection of sharp items used in human and animal medical applications.

Reusable items contaminated with blood and body substances should be washed and disinfected by a competent person or disposed of safely.

If a first aider sustains a sharps injury or thinks they are at risk of infection, they should seek prompt medical advice.

Cleaning Spills

Cleaning should start as soon as possible after an incident involving blood or body substances. First aiders should:

• Wear disposable gloves when cleaning spills.
• Use additional protective equipment, such as eye protection, plastic aprons, and masks, if splashes may occur.

Surfaces contaminated with blood or body substances should be wiped with paper towelling and cleaned with warm soapy water. In most cases, sodium hypochlorite (chlorine bleach) is unnecessary for managing spills but may be used in specific circumstances, such as hard-to-clean surfaces.