COVID-19 and hospital infection prevention and control awareness among health care workers in a tertiary care hospital: A questionnaire-based survey

Agarwal S, Jafar H, Garg A, Prakash V, Verma D, Sonkar L.

Pdf Page Numbers :- 222-227

Saumya Agarwal^1,*, Haniya Jafar¹, Ankur Garg², Ved Prakash¹, Deepika Verma¹, and Lautika Sonkar¹

¹Department of Microbiology, Rohilkhand Medical College and Hospital, Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh-243006, India

²Department of Anaesthesiology, Rohilkhand Medical College and Hospital, Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh-243006, India

*Corresponding author: Dr. Saumya Agarwal, Assistant professor, Department of Microbiology, Rohilkhand Medical College and Hospital, Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh-243006, India. Email: drsaumya.agarwal@gmail.com

Received 12 July 2021; Revised 2 September 2021; Accepted 10 September 2021; Published 18 September 2021

Citation: Agarwal S, Jafar H, Garg A, Prakash V, Verma D, Sonkar L. COVID-19 and hospital infection prevention and control awareness among health care workers in a tertiary care hospital: A questionnaire-based survey. J Med Sci Res. 2021; 9(4):222-227. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17727/JMSR.2021/9-34

Copyright: © 2021 Agarwal S et al. Published by KIMS Foundation and Research Center. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

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Abstract

Background: Healthcare workers (HCWs) are the frontline warriors in combating the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and due of the unavailability of targeted therapy, infection prevention and control practices (IPC) remain their key weapon. Effective implementation of recommended IPC strategies is essential for prevention of transmission of COVID-19 infection in health care settings. So, periodic assessment of knowledge, attitude and practices (KAP) of HCWs is required to provide adequate health education and training.

Objective: To assess knowledge, attitude and practices of health care workers regarding COVID-19 relevant IPC practices.

Material and methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted in a tertiary care hospital from 1st April to 15th April 2021. A 21-item questionnaire was developed based on recommendations of World Health Organizatio (WHO) and Centre for Disease Control (CDC). The questionnaire was shared with faculty, postgraduate residents and medical undergraduates via whatsapp messenger. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS 17 and Chi-square test was used for comparing variables.

Results: A total of 317 participants had responded, out of which 55% were females. Majority of the respondents were medical undergraduates (70%) followed by medical postgraduates (18%) and faculty (12%). The mean cumulative KAP score of study participants was 18.01+2.08, suggesting that a good number of participants had adequate knowledge, positive attitude and appropriate practices.

Conclusion: Our survey showed that the study participants had adequate awareness and adherence to COVID-19 relevant IPCs recommendations. Periodic training programs are still needed to address the shortcomings in infection control and prevention.

Keywords: COVID-19; knowledge; attitude; practice; healthcare workers; infection prevention; control