مرکز منطقه ای اطلاع رساني علوم و فناوري - EVALUATJON OF NEEDLESTICK AND SHARP INJURIES IN HEALTH WORKERS

Abstract :

Objective: Importance of employee safety increases every day to toke a good work performance from employees. High risk of contaminated needlestick-sharp object injuries when providing health service decreases motivation of health employees. The purpose of this study is to determine the risk for nurses and other health workers, who compose on important group in health employees, to be subject to needlestick-shorp object injuries and their causes.Methods: The study made a retrospective evaluation of sharp object injuries of nurses working at a Mug/a S1tk1 Kor;man University Training and Research Hospital used by the Ministry of Health and Mug/a S1tkJ Kor;man University Faculty of Medicine in common. Needlestick-sharp object injuries between January 2012-June 2013 among hospital employees and their reasons were examined. Hospital employees were classified mainly as nurses, doctors and others.Results: 1300 health personnel working at the hospital composed from 317 nurses, 175 doctors and 808 other employees. 46 sharp object injuries were reported in total. The most frequent needlestick-shorp object injury was among the nurse group with 32 (69.6%) persons and other personnel and doctors follow them. The most frequent reason of injury among nurse group was bloodletting with 21.9% persons. Next frequent reasons were medical waste sorting with 18.8% persons, closing injector cover with 15.6% persons and establishing vascular access with 15.6% persons.Conclusion: The study determined that nurses are the most vulnerable group about needlestick-sharp object injuries among health employees. Most of injuries occur during bloodletting, establishing vascular access and closing injector cover. These results indicate that medical devices used by nurse groups should be developed for a safer work process and continuous education is necessary on this area.