Minor surgery in general practice--setting the standards.
BACKGROUND: A self-assessment tool was trialled to set a baseline for control of infection in general practice and to assess the nature and adequacy of infection control precautions in primary care settings with particular reference to minor surgery. METHODS: A request for volunteers was included in a flier sent out periodically by the Communicable Disease Unit to all general practices in the county (n = 114). Eleven practices (9.6 per cent) volunteered to take part and an audit of infection control precautions was undertaken with the practice nurse and/or manager. RESULTS: Of the 11 general practices audited, nine did not have a written policy for control of infection, did not have a separate, dedicated room for minor surgery, did not use protective clothing appropriately, used terry towels for hand-drying and reprocessed single-use only items. Ten used inappropriate methods to decontaminate heat labile items, seven did not record sterilizer processing cycles and five did not comply with HTM 2010 with regard to sterilizer maintenance. Following the survey, minimum infection control requirements have been developed for future applications to provide extended minor surgery within general practice and these will be monitored at subsequent surgery inspection visits and through audit. CONCLUSIONS: Results suggest that there is little room for complacency with regard to standards of infection control in general practice. In view of the increasing shift towards primary care based minor surgery it would be helpful if minimum standards were to be agreed nationally.