Aide-memoire: personal protective equipment. In: Infection prevention and control: guidance to action tools (2021)

Actions to ensure reliable improvements in infection prevention and control (IPC) practices.

Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), i.e. mask, eye protection, gowns, gloves, is part of standard and transmission-based precautions (droplet/contact/airborne). Although the use of PPE is the most visible control used to prevent the spread of acute respiratory infection, it is only one of the IPC measures and should not be relied upon as a primary prevention strategy. In the absence of hand hygiene, effective administrative and engineering controls, PPE has limited benefit.

How should I use this aide-memoire?

1. Familiarize yourself with the content of each of the five colour-coded sections.
2. Consider each of the action checks to make a plan, and outline them in discussions with others on the improvements to be made, when preparing to implement WHO guidance, or at any time when aiming to improve adherence to IPC guideline recommendations.
3. Take action to make improvements where needed, using the action checks (some web links are also provided to help if you do not know where to start). Note that this process will likely be cyclical/ongoing until all practices are reliably improved and sustained.