Background: Ensuring oral care provision to patients admitted with a disabling stroke can have far-reaching implications, including reduced incidence of complications such as aspiration pneumonia.
Aims: To meet the standards of nursing care in the delivery of oral hygiene in stroke patients and to observe the impact of administering regular supervised oral care on the length of patient stay.
We included 100 patients admitted to the Acute Stroke Unit at our hospital with either Dysphagia on admission, kept Nil by mouth or on Nasogastric feed between April and August 2020. Patients received full oral care once and twice daily in the first and second PDSA cycles, respectively.
The incidence of chest infection in stroke patients reduced from 30% to 18% with increased oral care frequency. The percentage of patients requiring antibiotic therapy was lower at 26% in those receiving twice-daily oral care compared to 38% in those receiving once-daily oral care. The total number of antibiotic courses was fewer in patients with twice-daily oral care (16 vs 23). Patients with increased oral care frequency stayed longer in hospital (8.35 vs 6.29 days), had lower inpatient mortality (12% vs 16%) and better outcome (discharge NIHSS 2.5 vs 2).
The incidence of chest infection and mortality in stroke patients can be reduced with enhanced oral care. Checking the patient's oral health should be done by all team members to enable early identification of care deficiencies. The education and training of all members of the team are essential to ensuring good oral hygiene.
Not applicable