Study of biomedical waste management among healthcare personnel at a Tertiary hospital in Lucknow district

Abstract

Background: Healthcare facilities are like a double-edged sword, it caters to the healthcare needs and problems of the people by providing curative, promotive or preventive services but in the process it inevitably produces waste which in itself is hazardous to health if not managed properly. In order to improve biomedical waste management, it is important to understand and evaluate the current practices in biomedical waste management, to identify the gaps and to address them. The study was conducted to assess the practice of biomedical waste management among the healthcare personnel at a tertiary hospital.Methods: A hospital based cross sectional study was conducted among 314 healthcare personnel which comprised of 193 doctors, 85 staff nurses and 36 laboratory technicians. A pre-tested semi-structured questionnaire was used to collect the data. Results: A total of 78% healthcare personnel had received training on BMW management. Most of the doctors (76.2%), staff nurses (70.6%) and laboratory technicians (72.2%) had received hepatitis B vaccination. And as for injection TT, 76.2% doctors, 85.9% staff nurses and 69.4% laboratory technicians had received it. Multivariate logistic regression showed association between waste segregation practices and occupation status and training which was statistically significant. Conclusions: The study revealed satisfactory practices among the healthcare personnel. It also showed association between waste segregation practices and training on BMW management. The importance of training regarding biomedical waste management cannot be overemphasized, training and retraining on healthcare waste management should be given to healthcare personnel.