Assessment of Effectiveness of Educational Intervention on Practice among Bio-Medical Waste Handler

Background: The seriousness of improper bio-medical waste management was brought to the light during summer 1998. Data available from Indian studies, mostly hospitals, indicate that roughly about 1-5kg/ bed/day of waste is generated.1 The Knowledge of medical, paramedical staff about the biomedical waste management is important to improve the biomedical waste management practices.2 Aim: To improve environmental sanitation, reduce the risk of infectious and toxic waste to the biomedical waste handlers and the community. Objectives: 1. To assess the status of practice among bio-medical waste handlers regarding disposal of biomedical waste in Krishna Hospital, Karad.2. To assess the status of practice among bio-medical waste handlers regarding disposal of biomedical waste after the educational Intervention.3. To determine the association of practice among bio-medical waste handlers with selected socio demographic variables. Material& methods: A before and after interventional study was carried out on the same group of participants i. e. biomedical waste handlers at Krishna Hospital, Karad in the state of Maharashtra from October 2008 to September 2013. Results: Area wise effectiveness of educational intervention has shown an improvement in proportion of workers improvement related to practice correctly. The percentage improvement ranged from 6.4 to 78.1 %. Least improvement was observed in the area of categorization of human anatomical waste and action to be taken after the needle stick injuries. In all except two areas there has been improvement in proportion of biomedical waste handlers practicing them correctly.