Compliance with isolation precautions at a university hospital

Compliance with isolation precautions recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ( CDC) was evaluated in 3 hospital-wide observational surveys. The compliance rate, by type of isolation, was as follows: droplet transmission, 100% ( 4 observations); airborne transmission, 61.5% ( 13 observations); contact isolation, 73.3% ( 165 observations); and protective isolation, 73.6% ( 72 observations). As with hand hygiene, there is suboptimal compliance with recommended isolation precautions.