What is the purpose of standard precautions?

• A. To prevent transmission of infectious agents by treating all blood and body fluids as potentially infectious, using PPE, proper hand hygiene, and safe handling of sharps.
• B. To isolate every patient in a single room.
• C. To conserve PPE.
• D. To use as few PPE as possible.

Answer: (C)

Standard precautions are the baseline measures used to prevent the spread of infection during all patient care. The main idea is to treat all blood and body fluids as potentially infectious and to protect both the patient and the healthcare worker by using personal protective equipment, performing proper hand hygiene, and handling sharps and contaminated materials safely. This approach acknowledges that infections can be transmitted by contact with blood, body fluids, non‑intact skin, or mucous membranes, and you can’t reliably know who is infectious just by looking. Hand hygiene before and after patient contact, appropriate use of gloves, gowns, masks, or eye protection as the risk requires, and safe disposal of needles and other sharps are all core parts of this practice. While conserving PPE is important in many settings, it is not the purpose of standard precautions—the purpose is to prevent transmission of infection at every patient interaction, with isolation precautions added only when there is a known or suspected higher-risk infection.