Abstract:
Background: Health care workers (HCWs) are at a great risk of occupational exposure with
blood borne pathogens like Hepatitis B virus. The risk of occupational exposure to such infection
has been the concerns of HCWs for years. However, there is scarcity of information on
prevalence and risk factors of Hepatitis B virus infection in the study area.
Objective: To assess the level of knowledge on risk factors of hepatitis B virus infections and
vaccine, history of accidental exposure to body fluids and their vaccinations status against HBV
infection among health care workers in Jimma University specialized hospital.
Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 246 health care workers in JUSH,
Jimma town, Oromia region, Southwest Ethiopia. Data was collected in month of August 2015
by structured self –administered questionnaire which was used to collect information on sociodemographic characteristics, knowledge of the risk factors for HBV infections and HBV vaccine,
section on history of accidental exposure to HBV and section on vaccination status. Data was
coded, entered and analyzed using SPSS software version 20.0
Result and discussion: A total of 260 questionnaires were distributed to the Health Care
workers (HCWs) working in the study area and 246 were completed and returned giving a
response rate of 94.6%. Majority of the respondents, 131(53.3%), were male and 144(58.5%) of
them were nurses. Most of the respondents had history of hollow needle injury which accounts
112(45.5 %) and a total of 203(82.5%) had history of mucosal exposure to different type of body
fluids. About 128(52 %) of had fair knowledge of the risk factors to HBV infection and
133(52.4%) considered health care setting as high risk to HBV infection despite the fact that only
3(3.3%) of them were adequately vaccinated.
Conclusion: The study has clearly shown that most of them had fair knowledge about risk of
HBV infection and were not vaccinated against HBV mainly because of expensiveness of
vaccine and lack of motivation. Hence, sensitizing HCWs either by training or using Medias is
better in addition to providing vaccine to HCWs as part of work place safety before their
beginning of clinical practices.
