Effect of in-house training of health care personnel on biomedical waste management in a tertiary care hospital, Warangal, Telangana, India

Abstract

Background: Every day, relatively large amount of potentially infectious and hazardous wastes is generated in the health-care hospitals and facilities around the world. Indiscriminate disposal and improper management of waste generated in health care facilities causes serious threat to environment and to human health that requires specific treatment and management prior to its final disposal.Methods: Cross-sectional study was conducted among 241 health care personnel working at Mahatma Gandhi Memorial hospital, Warangal. Data was collected and pre and post analysis was done using a pre-validated self-administered questionnaire. Data was entered in MS Excel and analysed using SPSS 17 software.Results: Among 241 respondents, 33.2% were sanitary staff, 35.3% are nursing staff and 31.5% are nursing students. Only 35.7% of participants has knowledge regarding the colour of the bag into which expired antibiotics are discarded and 45.2% of participants were aware of the colour of the bag in which IV bottles, gloves were discarded. Scoring for 10 was done in both pre and post-test and post test scores were found to be higher and there is significant increase in level of knowledge of biomedical waste management rules in study population in post-test analysis (p<0.001).Conclusions: Training program on the waste management in the health sector has significant effect in increasing knowledge of the healthcare personnel.