Impact of COVID-19 pandemic waves on health-care worker hand hygiene activity in department of medicine and ICU as measured by an automated monitoring system.

Background: Hand hygiene (HH) compliance among health-care workers is important for preventing transmission of infectious diseases.

Aim: To describe health-care worker hand hygiene activity in ICU and non-ICU patients' rooms, using an automated monitoring system (AMS), before and after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: At the Intercommunal Hospital of Créteil, near Paris, France, alcohol-based hand sanitizer (ABHS) consumption in the Department of Medicine (DM) and ICU was recorded using an AMS during four periods: before, during, and after the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, and during its second wave.