Assessment of Awareness and Practices of Biomedical Waste Management Among Nursing Staff at Al-Wahda Hospital in Derna, Libya.

Abstract

A healthcare worker that produces waste as part of their job is a 'waste producer'. Healthcare waste is of great importance due to its potential environmental hazards and public health risks. The objectives of this study were to assess the awareness and practices of staff nurses related to healthcare waste management at Al-Wahda Hospital in Derna, Libya. A descriptive cross-sectional design was used to conduct the study. The study was carried out in January 2022 and comprised all nurses who were working in the study setting, with a total number of 93 nurses. Data were collected using a questionnaire and observational check. Data were entered and analysed using SPSS. The mean age of participants was 27.80 ± 7.97 years, and more than 55.4% of them had experienced five years or less. Only 30.4% of participants attended a training on medical waste management. The results revealed that the majority of nurses' staff have unsatisfactory awareness regarding healthcare waste management and have inadequate practices in most areas of waste management. The awareness and practices about HCW management among nurses' staff at Al-Wahda Hospital were found to be very poor. This could be because the majority of the respondents were not trained on ways of handling MW since the government does not provide experts to conduct those training programmes, like once per year or twice for HW, ensuring MW are well observed.