Virender Verma*1, Priya Soni2. Meenakshi Kalhan3, Sanjiv Nanda4, Anjani Kumar5, Vivek Nandan6
Background and purpose: From antiquity, the healthcare facilities have treated sick people but there was little awareness about the fact that hospitals generate a lot of hazardous bio-medical waste, which had been disposed without proper guidelines. Lately, it has been a proven thing that bio-medical-waste is a potential hazard for heath- personals, and environment. Therefore, it must be disposed in a proper manner. Objectives: This was an observational study carried out at one of the tertiary care hospitals in Rajgarh city about the knowledge, attitude and practices of the hospital staff about the bio-medical waste management. Material and method: An observational (cross-sectional) study using questionnaires was carried out at one of the non-NABH accredited tertiary care hospitals of Rajgarh City in Rajasthan (India). Results: More than 70% staff (except housekeeping) had good ideas about waste categories, segregation and color coding except in radioactive waste. The house keeping staff did well in 3 categories (Linen, sharps and glasses). Most of the employees have clarity about BMW except the housekeeping staff which did well on most of parameters accept barcoding, pretreatment of anatomical/ biotechnology waste, knowledge about STP plant (Sewage treatment plant), Hazmat and signage. On actual hospital rounds we found that the hazmat practices were in a poor shape. Most of staff was aware occupational hazards except housekeeping staff. Conclusion: A written policy, induction training of healthcare workers, constant and repetitive workshops, and motivation are important human factors to implement the biomedical waste practices in a small-scale healthcare organization. Risk-stratification, understanding of health hazards and how to activate hazmat protocols are important things which are to be brought into practice
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