A KAP Study of Occupational Exposures to Blood and Body Fluids Among Nursing Staff of Tertiary Level Hospitals of Delhi

Abstract

Health care professionals, particularly nursing staff, are at risk of occupational exposure to blood and body fluids. A total of 250 nurses from two similar tertiary level institutions were included in this study which revealed the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of nursing professionals with regard to prevention of occupational exposure to various injuries at their workplace. The type of exposures and their associations with risk behaviors were also analyzed by using logistic regression. Majority of nurses (97.6%) stated that they were aware of the universal work precautions (UWP), but among these, only 59% could correctly define UWP. More than half (54.8%) of nurses recap or manipulate needle after use as a practice. One third (33.2%) of the nurses were ever exposed to blood or body fluids at least once in the past six months, with needle stick injury being the most common type of exposure. Only one tenth of the nurses reported the injury
to the authorities. Exposure prevalence was seen to be significantly higher (p<0.001) among those nurses who had either never received, or received a formal training more than two years ago. Practice of always
wearing gloves among the study participants was seen as a protective factor from exposures at the workplace. (Adjusted odds ratio = 0.36, 95% C.I. 0.17–0.78).

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