Abstract:
Background: Nurses, doctors and anesthetists/anesthesiologist composing the main surgical team members are at very high risk of exposure to blood borne pathogens. This is because the nature of their work which involves constant exposure to sharps and instruments used during invasive procedures in theatre, and contact with blood and body fluids. The effect of these exposures ranges from psychological trauma and stress to infection with incurable conditions. The aim of the study was to assess knowledge, attitude and practice among surgical team members on blood and body fluids exposure as a key measure towards prevention.
Methods: A non-experimental quantitative descriptive cross-sectional was used and sampling strategy was total population sampling (TPS). A self-administered questionnaire was used for gathering information from surgical team members of University Teaching Hospital of Kigali. Analysis of data was descriptive statistics to include frequency and percentage. Inferential statistics included Chi- square and regression.
Results: The findings of the study showed that out of 69 (97.2%) of participants experienced BBF in their daily activities and 48 (63.4%) of participants they did not report the incident/accident of BBF exposure according to protocol. There was statistically significant differences (χ=0.044, df =4, p=0.05) relationship between knowledge and attitude, and practice of how often using PPE for BBF exposure prevention. The reasons given for occupational exposure to BBFs included the: the type of operation 31.5% followed by lack of protective measures 30.4 %.
Conclusion: The study revealed that participants had good knowledge and attitude PPE use as measures to prevent BBF exposure. Thirty-eight (53.5%) surgical team responded that PPEs are not available. The hospital needs to sensitize the surgical team on reporting systems to address and manage complications from BBF exposure and establish the real source of causes. More research is needed about this topic to include the health care providers working in different departments of the hospital.
