Patient Safety, Infection Control and Professional Practice
What this domain tests
Patient safety and infection control questions test standard precautions, decontamination, incident reporting and safe practice. Small details decide marks.
Infection control
- Perform hand hygiene before and after every patient contact (WHO five moments).
- Wear gloves for contact with tears, blood or broken skin; use eye protection for splash risk.
- Disinfect tonometer prisms with 70% isopropyl alcohol wipes or 10% sodium hypochlorite per local policy; allow drying.
- Trial lenses and contact lenses require approved disinfection; never use alcohol on soft lenses.
- Use single-use items where possible; dispose of sharps immediately.
Patient safety
- Confirm identity and the eye to be examined; document.
- Calibrate tonometers and check equipment.
- Report incidents and near misses; learn from them.
- Defer non-urgent testing in suspected adenoviral keratoconjunctivitis.
Worked example
A patient with a red, watery eye and recent conjunctivitis attends for tonometry. Reasoning: suspected adenoviral infection is highly contagious. Defer non-urgent tonometry, use gloves and a disposable prism if measurement is essential, clean the slit lamp, and advise hygiene.
Traps
Skipping hand hygiene between patients; using alcohol on hydrogel trial lenses; failing to document disinfection; ignoring a sharps injury.