Awareness and Compliance with Guidelines on Occupational Exposure to HIV by Healthcare Workers in Southeast Nigeria

Abstract

Background and Objective: The risk of occupational exposure to HIV virus in sub-Saharan Africa is increased by non-adherence to the principles of infection prevention practices. This study assessed the level of awareness and compliance with guideline on occupational exposure to HIV by health care workers (HCW).
Materials and Methods: A questionnaire survey of 392 HCW in two tertiary health institutions in southeast Nigeria over a 3-month period.
Results: Despite exposure of majority (61.2%) of respondents to patients\' body fluid, there was poor compliance with the guidelines on occupational exposure in the hospitals. While 281 (71.7%) respondents were aware of CDC guideline on occupational exposure, only one tenth (n=29) of them knew that such guideline was operational in the hospital. The only content of the guideline known to all the respondents was treatment of the exposed or inoculation site. Most of the exposed respondents refused HIV testing because of fear of testing HIV positive. There was no proper information dissemination to the workers on hospital safety precautions, incident reporting and treatment procedure following occupational exposure. The average time for initiation of chemoprophylaxis following exposure to HIV virus was 55 hours because of logistics.
Conclusion: The HCW showed poor knowledge of CDC Guideline on occupational exposure. There is need for hospital authorities to ensure staff education on safety measures, efficient incident reporting system, expeditious source testing, timely evaluation and management of exposed health care worker.


Keywords: HIV exposure, Guideline, Compliance, Health care worker, Nigeria.

Journal of College of Medicine Vol. 13 (2) 2008: pp. 96-100