Study of knowledge attitude and practice amongst interns, residents and para-medical staff regarding transmission and prevention of hepatitis-B of C. U. Shah Medical College and Hospital, Surendranagar

ABSTRACT

Background: Hepatitis B is global infectious diseases with estimated two billions of the world population have contracted the infection, of them there are 350 million with chronic infection. Hepatitis B disease may lead to state of chronic carrier, liver cirrhosis and failure or hepatocellular carcinoma.Methods: This was a cross-sectional study which involved 100 intern, 100 resident doctors, and 100 paramedical staff; data collection was performed by a suitable self-administered, close-ended questionnaire.Results: Medical staff members had better knowledge about hepatitis B than the paramedical staff in the study. More than 50% of the paramedical staff didn’t know the correct mode of hepatitis b transmission. Attitude towards vaccination was seen significantly high in interns and resident doctors, as more than 88% had taken hepatitis b vaccine as compared to only 57% from paramedical staff had taken vaccine. Only 55% of paramedical staff had strictly followed universal precautions which was statistically significant in medical and paramedical staff.Conclusions: This study highlights the dissimilarities in knowledge, attitude as well as practices amongst different categories of healthcare personnel regarding hepatitis B infection. The most distressing situation was of paramedical staff that was at the lowest strata in terms of both knowledge and practices and therefore was at highest risk of hepatitis B infection.