Prevalence and Risk Factors of Occupational Health Hazards among Health Care Workers in Health Facilities in the Atwima Nwabiagya Municipality.

Abstract

This study assessed the prevalence, pattern, and risk factors of occupational health hazards among healthcare workers in the Atwima Nwabiagya South of the Ashanti Region. The study adopted a cross-sectional design to assess the prevalence, pattern, and risk factors of occupational health hazards faced by health care workers in health facilities. A simple random technique was used to recruit 385 participants, who were surveyed using a structured questionnaire by self-administration. The data was summarized using descriptive and inferential statistics to investigate relationships between variables. The majority (60.3%) of the participants were females. Medical and dental practitioners made up 9.4%, laboratory scientists 3.4%, and other allied health professionals 31.4%. Mortuary staff accounted for 1.3%. Of their academic qualification, 46.2% of participants were diploma holders, 30.1% had bachelor's degrees, 11.4% earned postgraduate degrees, 6.2% had certificates, and 6.0% had other qualifications. All participants (100%)-participants had been exposed to dangerous pathogens, of which 7.0% acquired Respiratory Tract Infection, 8.1% acquired influenza, 70.9% had COVID19, while 14.4% acquired other infectious diseases. The risk matrix scores indicate that 18.7%, 15.8%, 13.2%, 13.0%, and 11.2% occurred in the laboratory, mortuary, isolation unit, medical imaging, and emergency departments, respectively. Furthermore, 10.4%, 9.6%, and 8.1% occurred at Out patient department, Theatre/ Intensive care unit, and Antenatal clinic, respectively. In respect of Health facility related factors leading to occupational hazards, most of them 141(36.6%) said, absence of safety guidelines by management, 113(29.4) said workload and stress due to inadequate staff strengths, 68(17.7%) said poor working environment, 34(8.8%) indicated that they lack supervision from OHS managers and 29(7.5%) said lack of proper safety gears from management also accounted for health facility related factors leading to occupational health hazards. Periodic training and follow-up assessments regarding bio-safety measures for the healthcare workers should be implemented. Finally, future explorative studies are warranted on the feasibility of implementing rotation-based postings for healthcare workers in different healthcare settings.