Objective: Paramedic students may expose to infection from patients during emergency patient treatment and transport services while receiving ambulance attendant training. For this reason, infection control and education are required. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the awareness and performance on infection control during ambulance attendant training and provide basic data for infection control.
Methods: In this study, a survey was conducted from May 1 to July 30, 2015, targeting 235 paramedic students from 8 universities, who completed ambulance attendant training and gave written consent to participating in this study under the provision of IRB (KNU_IRB_2015_23). The questionnaire consisted of a total of 51 questions. The infection control dimension was divided into hand washing, personal protective equipment, and environmental management, and for each sub-dimension the awareness and performance were measured with a 4-point scale. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS statistics ver. 22.0.
Results: 1) Among the subjects, 51.1% were male. Additionally, 71.1% received more than one clinical training at hospital before ambulance attendant training; 55.7% received ambulance attendant training in their 2nd year. The subjects who completed an orientation at ambulance attendant training were 95.3%, and among them 71.7% received education on infection. 2) With regard to the awareness of infection control, hand washing was 3.72 points; personal protective equipment, 3.74 points; and environmental management, 3.66 points. With regard to the performance, hand washing was 3.08 points; personal protective equipment, 3.20 points; and environmental management, 3.04 points. In all three sub-dimensions, hand washing (p<.001), personal protective equipment (p<.001), and environmental management (p<.001), the awareness was higher than the performance. 3) In general characteristics, the item showing a significant difference in the awareness of hand washing was the presence of orientation (p=.006), and the items showing a significant difference in the awareness of environmental management included the grade of students at ambulance attendant training (p=.005) and the region of training (p=.002). The item revealing a significant difference in the performance of hand washing was the presence of education on infection (p=.019). 4) As a training advisor (paramedic) has higher performance levels in hand washing and personal protective equipment, the subject''s performance levels in hand washing (p<.001), gloves (p=.006), and mask (p=.002) were higher. 5) The infection control showed a positive correlation (r=.394, p<.001), in which as awareness increases, performance rises. For each sub-dimension, the correlation coefficient of the infection control was r=.330 with hand washing (p<.001); r=.390 with personal protective equipment (p<.001); and r=.457 with environmental management (p<.001).
Conclusion: In infection control of paramedic students during ambulance attendant training, in order to increase the performance of hand washing, personal protective equipment, and environmental management, education to improve the awareness should be prepared, and a paramedic with higher performance levels in hand washing, and gloves and mask wearing needs to be assigned as a training advisor.

Key Words: Ambulance attendant training, Paramedic students, Infection control