HEALTH CARE WORKERS’ COMPLIANCE WITH STANDARD PRECAUTIONS AND ASSOCIATED FACTORS IN HOSPITALS OF BAHIR DAR TOWN, AMHARA REGION, NORTHWEST ETHIOPIA

Abstract

According to the literature, there is a substantial difference in compliance with infection prevention standard precautions in different health care settings, and with the majority of studies focusing primarily on public health facilities. Although assessing the comliance of health care workers in private and public institutions would give comprehensive evidence on existing problems and appropriate prevention method, according to the knowledge of the investigator there are limited evidence in Ethiopia particularly, in the study area. Therefore, this study will provide evidence on the extent of compliance and associated factors among health careworkers in Bahir Dar town hospitals. Objective:- To assess the health care workers’compliance with standard precautions and associated factors in hospitals of Bahir Dar town, in Amhara region, North West Ethiopia, from June 10 to 30, 2021. Method:- An institution-based cross-sectional study design was applied among 442 hospital health care workers. The study subjects were selected using a stratified random sampling technique. The data were collected using self-administered questionnaires and an observational checklist. The collected data were entered into Epi data and exported into SPSS for analysis. Bivariate and multivariable analysis were used to assess the association between independent variables and the outcome variable. Odds ratios at 95% CI was computed to measure the strength of the association between the outcome and the explanatory variables and was considered statistically significant when the P-value was ˂ 0.05 Result:- of the 442 health care workers participated in the study, 41% were compliant with infection prevention standard precautions. Consistent water supply availability [AOR = 1.92, 95% CI = 1.63, 6.27], and access to infection prevention guideline [AOR=1.73, 95% CI =1.08, 2.77] and availability of of PPE [AOR = 2.32, 95%CI =1.35, 3.98] and were of the factors significantly associated with health care workers’ compliance. Conclusion;- Two-fifths of health workers complied standard precautions. These findings suggest that the majority of health-care workers are not following standard precautions and are at a significant risk of developing a health-care-acquired infection. These identified factors should be taken into account while developing interventions