Introduction
Hospitals’ safety climates have been correlated with incidents of exposure to blood and body fluids.
Objectives
We examined the relationship between laboratory safety climates and hazardous incidents among laboratory personnel at selected health facilities in Kenya.
Anzeige
Methods
A survey on history of hazardous incidents and safety mechanisms was conducted among laboratory personnel in Kenya. A hazard was defined as a fall, inhalation of harmful gas, ingestion of hazardous agents, subcutaneous chemical exposure, sharp injury or a hazardous spill. The laboratory safety climate was rated on a ten point scale. We used univariate analyses to describe the relationship between experiencing a hazard and the safety climate.
Results
One hundred and thirteen laboratory personnel were interviewed; the median duration of service was 4.0 years (range 0.2 - 33 years), 62 (53%) had received Hepatitis B vaccination and 18 (16%) had been previously trained on biosafety. Health facilities were equipped with; sharps’ disposal facilities (90%), PPE (82%), waste disposal mechanisms (60%), containment of hazardous wastes (38%), fire safety equipment (38%), vaccination measures (28%), reporting mechanisms for exposures (22%), safety equipment (19%), protocols for occupational injuries documentation (17%) and safety audits (10%). Eighty-one (77%) laboratory personnel had experienced a hazard. Having been vaccinated against Hepatitis B, trained on biosafety, availed to safety mechanisms and work duration were not associated with history of a hazard.
Conclusion
Although the relationship between hazardous incidents and safety mechanisms is not of statistical significance, the absence of appropriate laboratory safety mechanisms it is still of public health concern. Equipping labs with necessary safety infrastructure as well as assessing personal factors related to injuries may decrease the incidences of laboratory hazards.
Disclosure of interest
None declared.
Anzeige
This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.