As a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, a shift in society has occurred towards an increased focus on maintaining proper sanitation within high traffic areas found in public and at home. The shift towards these behaviors is in accordance with the CDC, which published recommendations of proper sanitation behaviors and commonplace areas to focus on. With sanitation concerns in mind, daily personal items, such as smartwatches, can be unnoticed possible carriers for a multitude of germs and viruses such as COVID-19. Smartwatches as potential transmission hotspots is an area not widely studied in literature today. As a result, due to the possibility of smartwatches as carriers and limited research surrounding this topic, research on sanitation behavior of smartwatches is crucial. The purpose of this study is to identify smartwatch sanitation behavior within a population of incoming healthcare professionals. The objective behind collecting this data is to determine if there is a need for education on the topic of smartwatch sanitation. Additionally, this data sets the stage for research of what microorganisms and illnesses are present on smartwatches in the clinical setting. Data collection was accomplished via a Qualtrics survey administered to the Doisy College of Health Sciences at SLU (N=300). The data showed no significant relationship between smartwatch sanitation frequency and the factors analyzed: gender, major, educational year, or length of ownership. Furthermore, the results obtained show a majority of students never clean their smartwatches and indicates the need for education on the importance of smartwatch sanitation.

Michael Kanai and Paul Mikuzis would like to thank their faculty sponsor Dr. Elaina Osterbur for support with this project. Dr. Osterbur assisted in all aspects of the project and was always there bringing positive energy to meetings and offering feedback that enabled us to produce our successful research.