Hospital waste management status in university hospitals of the Fars province, Iran

Abstract

Hospital waste contains large quantities of hazardous materials. In Iran, as in many developing countries, not much attention has been paid to this matter. Little information is available regarding the generation and disposal of medical waste in Iran, and this fact hinders planning for a better management of the aforementioned waste. This paper describes a survey performed on the collection and disposal of waste in the university hospitals of the Fars province, which are the medical referral centres in the southern half of the country, and the results obtained are fully discussed. The lack of separation between hazardous and non- hazardous waste, an absence of necessary rules and regulations applying to the collection of waste from the hospital wards and the on-site transport to a temporary storage location, a lack of proper waste treatment, disposal of hospital waste along with municipal garbage, insufficient training of personnel, insufficient personal protective equipment and lack of knowledge regarding the proper use of such equipment, were the main findings. For a rapid improvement of existing conditions, performing extensive research for the assessment of present situation in the hospitals of this country, compilation of rules and establishment of standards along with effective training for the personnel is recommended.

Healthcare wastes management practices by public health facilities in Oshimili-South LGA of Delta State, South-South Nigeria

“…This seemingly poor usage of PPEs among sanitation staffs was also found among sanitation staff of in the study in Rawalpindi, Pakistan 29 and also lack of knowledge of use of PPEs in the study at the Fars University, hospital in Iran. 24 Average waste generation per bed was 2.40kg/bed/day and this was similar to what was obtained in the FCT, Abuja, Nigeria where it was stated to 2.78kg/bed/day. 18 Lower values have been reported from Lagos, 19 Ilorin, 20 and Irrua, 16 However, per capital waste generation was much higher in Iran and the United States where it was 4.45kg and 6.93kg/bed/day respectively.…”

“…22 In this study, only 43.3% of the respondents practiced waste segregation by disposing waste into colour coded plastic bags or containers, while 58.8% of the respondents deposit both medical and non-medical waste into same plastic or containers. Segregation of medical waste from non-medical waste was almost completely lacking in this study except from segregation of sharps, and this is in keeping with several studies like the study in two general hospitals in Lagos, Nigeria, 3 Another study in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nigeria 18 ; studies in the Fars Province of Iran 23 and the University Hospital in Fars, Iran 24 ; other studies in Jos 25 and PortHarcourt, 26 Nigeria, that all reported poor segregation of medical from general wastes. Contrary to findings in this study, are reports of high priority segregation of infectious medical waste from general waste as reported in studies done in Lagos, Nigeria in two private and two public hospitals with bed capacity of 40 to 600 beds.…”

“…The study revealed that there was no statistically significant difference in training on HCWM in the different designation and also in the different healthcare facilities studied. These findings are not in keeping with the study in Karachi, Pakistan, 14 FCT, Nigeria, 18 Fars University Hospital, Iran 24 and the study in Rawalpindi, Pakistan 29 that all reported poor knowledge of HCW due poor training of healthcare workers. Proper training and management of healthcare workers with regard to HCWM is necessary, observance of standard precaution together with use of Personal Protective Equipments (PPEs) is also required.…”

“…These are risk not only to the workers but also to their family members. 24 In this study, use of PPEs was best among the doctors (100.0%), pharmacists (100.0%), and laboratory scientists (100.0%). Poor practice was observed among the nurses (56.9%) and the wastes handlers/health assistants (50.9%).…”

“…Black bags labeled 'general waste' for general (nonhazardous) waste like paper, food debris, cans etc and other labeled black bags for chemicals and drugs. After twenty four (24) hours, the bags were collected by the research team members. In the renal unit, theatre and labour rooms, wastes were weighed per shift because the nature of the waste required immediate disposal.…”