Knowledge, attitudes practice of infection prevention measure among health care providers at kafue district hospital, nchanga south mine hospital and maina soko military hospital

Abstract

The study was aimed at determining the knowledge, attitude and practice of infection prevention among the health care providers at Mina Soko Military Hospital, Kafue District Hospital and Nchanga South Mine Hospital. The focus was directed at knowledge, attitude and practice of health care providers on infection prevention measures. Studies have been done on general nurses, mid wives and medical doctors but no study has been done on other health care providers such as paramedics, non- proffessional health wokers and pschosocial councellors, thereby identifying a gap in the infection prevention practices.Infection prevention program has been promoted as a strategy to reduce nosocomial infections and to minimize adverse social outcomes associated with unexpected expenditure due to patients long staying in the hospitals. The researcher investigated the knowledge attitude and practice of infection prevention measures among the health care providers at Mina Soko Military Hospital, Kafue District Hospital in Lusaka Province and Nchanga South Mine Hospital on the Copper Belt province-Zambia.A cross sectional descriptive study was conducted at the above named hospitals. The study population included the medical doctors, nurses, paramedics, psychosocial counselors and non-professional health care providers. A sample comprising of 150 respondents was selected using systematic random sampling method. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect data. Quantitative data was grouped manually and was analyzed using the SPSS software of the computer. Data was presented in the form of frequency tables, pie-chats and bar-chats. Cross tabulations was used to determine the relationship between variables.The findings of the study revealed that all the respondents 100% (150) had heard about infection prevention. Out of the 100% who had heard of infection prevention 67% had high knowledge. The study also indicated that all the respondents 100 % (150) had positive attitude towards infection prevention. It was also discovered in the study that of the respondents 20% had poor practices. It is evident from the studies that knowledge influences attitude and attitude influences the practice. In order for one to have a positive attitude on infection prevention they require to have adequate knowledge on the topic. Adequate knowledge coupled with positive attitude would result into good infection prevention practices. From the study, 100% of the respondents had head about IP and they all had a positive attitude.The factors hindering good infection prevention practices among the health care providers were inadequate material resources and human resources. There was no factor on its on that contributed to the health care providers practice towards infection prevention. Therefore, there is need for authorities to attend to all the factors in order to meet the highest set standards in infection prevention.