Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices of Health Professionals on the Management of Biomedical Waste

Objective: To study the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of health professionals regarding the management of hospital waste in the Nongr-Massom health district. Method: This was a prospective cross-sectional study carried out from 25 July to 25 September 2016 in 10 public health institutions in the Nongr-Massom Health District. Questionnaire administration and observation were the techniques used for data collection. Results: The sample consisted of 246 health agents and 10 health institutions. The average seniority of the respondents was 13.18 years, with a standard deviation of 7.44 years. All the respondents had at least the primary level of education. Of the interviewees, 84% did not receive specific training on biomedical waste management. At the knowledge level, 23.8% of the respondents did not know how to define biomedical waste. The basic principles of sorting were less known. More than half of the respondents (50.5%) were unaware of the regulatory waste storage time. Almost all the interviewees (98.5%) were aware that biomedical waste presents a public health risk, and 79.1% gave high priority to the management of this waste. Production sorting was carried out by 63.6% of the surveyed health agents. Containers were often filled to overflow, and transportation means were generally not suitable. Liquid biomedical waste was thrown in a garbage/latrine, according to 60.20% of the respondents. Sufficient equipment, training of health agents, and capacity building of the health service were some of the suggestions made by the respondents during the survey. Seven (07) of the 10 surveyed health institutions did not have good minimum management of biomedical waste. In order to improve the quality of the management in the health district of Nongr-Massom, no efforts should be neglected by all the involved actors.