Survey on sharp injuries of medical staff and willingness and dilemma to use safety devices

  Objective  To evaluate the current situation of sharp instrument injuries and use of safety devices among medical staff.

  Methods  A total of 312 medical staff in a general hospital were investigated with questionnaire on the status of sharp instrument injury and the cognition of safety equipment.

  Results  Totally 300 medical staff (96.1%)completely filled the questionnaires, and 64.6% of the medical staff had suffered sharp injuries at least once in their career. Correlation analysis showed that the frequency of sharp instrument injury was related to medical staff's gender, job type, working age and working department(P < 0.05). The females, the nurses, or the staff with working age of 5-10 years or engaged in surgical operations were more likely to have sharp instrument injury. However, only 40.2% of the sharp injuries were reported voluntarily. The staff with longer working age preferred to report their sharp injuries, compared with whom with less working age (P < 0.05). There were significant differences in cognition of safety devices among medical staff with different gender, the job types or working age (P < 0.05). The females, the nurses or the staff with long working age were more familiar with the use of safety equipment; 60% of the medical staff were very willing to use the safety equipment, 34% of them wanted to try immediately, and 6% of them were not willing to try. There was a positive correlation between the willingness to use and working age(P < 0.05).

  Conclusions  To reduce the problem of sharp instrument injury, we should implement a more complete management mechanism, refine relevant requirements and establish a unified supervision system, so as to promote the wide use of safety equipment.