Infection Control, Safety, and Professional/Administrative Duties
Core concepts
Understand standard precautions: hand hygiene as the single most important measure, use of gloves and personal protective equipment, safe handling and disposal of sharps, and disinfection versus sterilization. Know the difference-disinfection reduces pathogens on surfaces and instruments, sterilization eliminates all microorganisms including spores. Learn to clean tonometer tips and slit-lamp surfaces between patients, to handle biohazard waste, and to follow exposure protocols after a needlestick. On the professional side, know confidentiality (protecting patient information), informed consent, scope of practice, accurate scheduling, insurance and billing basics, and the importance of complete, timely, legible records.
Traps
Frequent traps include confusing disinfection with sterilization and forgetting hand hygiene before and after patient contact. Another is breaching confidentiality-discussing patients in public areas or sharing information without authorization. Watch for questions about scope of practice where an administrative task is confused with a clinical one, and about proper sharps disposal (never recap by hand; use the safety device and sharps container).
Worked example / rule of thumb
Rule of thumb: "If it's wet and not yours, don't touch it without gloves." For any exposure incident, wash the area, report immediately, and follow the facility's post-exposure protocol.
Study focus
Review HIPAA-style confidentiality principles, consent, and documentation standards, since these recur in professional-practice items.