Knowledge and practice of universal precaution in a tertiary health facility.

BACKGROUND: The increased risk of health workers to contract HIV, hepatitis B and C viruses in their work place led to the development of universal precaution or infection control policy. This policy where applied, has been found to reduce the risk of contracting these infections in the work place. The aim of this study is to determine the knowledge and practice of this policy in University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH), Enugu.

METHODS: This study was cross-sectional in design. Subjects were health workers likely to be exposed to body fluid. The study tool was a self administered pre-tested questionnaire. Statistical analysis was done using SPSS version 11.5 software.

RESULTS: Two hundred and forty six health workers participated in the study, consisting of 150 females and 96 males. The male to female ratio was 1: 1.6. Majority of the respondents were between ages 20-49 years. One hundred and twenty four (50.4%) of the respondents were aware of universal precaution, while 88 (35.8%) knew the correct definition of universal precaution. Thirty four (13.8%) had received training on universal precaution however no ward attendant was trained. On multiple regression (P = 0.049) and training (P = 0.006) were the variables that were predictive of correct definition of universal precaution. Hands gloves were used by 86.6% of the respondents, 32.9% did not re-sheath needles and 43.9% practiced appropriate hand washing.

CONCLUSION: The level of knowledge and compliance with precaution by health workers in UNTH Enugu is low. Low level of training and unequal training exposure among the various occupations contributes to this.