Reducing waste mixture in accident& emergency department at King Faisal Hospital

Abstract

Background Health care activities generate different kind of wastes. These activities involving health promotion, medical diagnosis, treatment, scientific research, dental services. When the wastes from those ventures are not well managed, they are harmful to the humans and the environment. WHO reports that 2.3 to 4.6 people are infected by hepatitis B and C and 80,000 to 16,000 people are contaminated with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) due to unsafe disposal of sharps and poor waste management. Aim of the study: This project aimed to reduce the waste mixture rate in Accident and Emergency at King Faisal Hospital. Methods A pre and post intervention study was done to reduce the waste mixture by increasing the number of dustbins, putting waste segregation signs, close supervision measures and training on waste sorting at Accident and Emergency department, King Faisal Hospital. Observation in 23 dustbins was done, three times a day in each dustbin to measure the magnitude of the waste mixture in accident and Emergency, King Faisal Hospital. McNemar tests were used to compare the pre and post intervention on medical waste mixture and the measures taken. Data analysis was completed using SPSS version 22 at significance of <=P0,05. Results: The waste mixture improved from 84% in pre intervention to 15% in post intervention with P-value 0.001. The waste mixture in the red bin improved from 44.1% to 7.6%, the waste mixture in white bin improved from 3.3 % to 0.9% ,the waste mixture in the yellow bin from 5.1% to 0.9 % and the waste mixture in the black bins improved from 48.3% to 7.9 % . Conclusion: the reduction of waste mixture was achieved through training of the staff on waste sorting using color coding, infarcising on policy reading daily, every nurse was allocated in a specific room to facilitate close supervision, waste disposal tags were put in place on the dustbins, new bins were bought and labeled with waste disposal signs thus resulted into a tremendous reduction of waste mixture.